Worst reviewers: autothrall, noktorn, hells_unicorn...

Best reviewers: Mister Quickly, William Podmore, Matt Cale... oh fuck it!

Hey! Cale does have some good insight sometimes... Really, he does!

In his heyday, Cale *was funny*. Nowadays he mostly makes vaguely racebaiting comments on his forum...

Ah, right. I've never had the heart to venture out into the forums. I think I did check a thread four, five years back, but it was... Well, it was and wasn't very enlightening. If you know what I mean.

Calling someone a fungus is the best insult I've heard in a while! This made me laugh my ass off. Thanks!

On topic: Like most of the people who've posted in this thread, I don't agree with the OP. Because of reviewers like hells_unicorn and autothrall (the ones I usually agree with in terms of taste) I have discovered some of my currently favorite albums or bands even. If anything, I should be grateful that they take their time to write fun and helpful reviews that sometimes steer me towards avoiding a bad purchase or discovering a great album.

No problem though to be fair, I can't take credit. As it's actually a joke Autothrall made himself a while back.

Now that I think about it, I'm starting to get sick of this ConorFynes guy.

Yes, he really is abominable. Ironically, for all the albums he (supposedly) listens to and subsequently reviews, he's quite objectively wrong about a few things pertaining to genres and metal history. His insistence on referring to bands' members by name without checking sources to make sure the members in question are connected to that specific release are also pretty deplorable.

Factual inaccuracies is grounds for rejection so if it is bad enough then submit the reviews to the Oven Fodder thread.

Any true music fan has the right to review what ever album they wish. From the recording artists point of view, the best review is when a fan turns up the radio loud when your album cut comes on. When you lay down hard earned cash for an album. When you show up at our concerts and sing along with us and sweat with us. That is a review beyond words. You become the review. You become our music, our lyrics. Our reason for DOING. Love you.

Hello. Review what you feel. Its your opinion. No one has to agree. That shouldn't matter.

Best review is not written. Best review is cranking an album up loud, laying down hard earns cash as a vote by wallet or purse, but the absolute best review is going to a concert and singing along on your favorite song and sweating and dancing. That is a review that can make a next album better.

BTW. What's up with Ilwhyan and the " Behold Wizard " shtick? Is this a music forum or a D&D. Game forum? But, if it gets you through the night dude or dudette, drive on by all means.

What the fuck are you talking about man?

Agreed, what the hell is he going on about?

Hate to jump on the wagon like this, but yeah, who is this atgunn guy, and what the hell is he talking about?

Edit: Well, in his profile says he used to belong to an extremely obscure christian heavy metal band called First Strike. So..... Hello, Mr. Gunn?

Edit 2: What is your problem with Ilwhyan's signature, Tony?

I think I need to drink more beer before I understand this.

I like no one's reviews. So I just sit, write my own and read, admiring the intelligence and communication skills of the author. For greater self-esteem and swelll reviews just rm and repeat.

CircleOvZaphyan

Not at all. You might come across a familiar name every now and then, but I think there's quite a wide variety of reviewers.

I decided to take a look and see if I could find factual inaccuracies in his reviews. I'm just picking these out while reading through, not really double checking them.

http://www.metal-archives.com/reviews/T ... ConorFynes
"Frontman Johan Norstrom (also the head of Discouraged Records)"
I had to check on this one, but Discouraged Records doesn't mention him on their contact page, and all of the labels updates with a name on them are signed by the founder of the label. He is mentioned as a press contact for one band on the label.

http://www.metal-archives.com/reviews/B ... ConorFynes
"Black Sabbath took a more downtuned, heavier approach to rock music."
Incorrect, Black Sabbath did not tune down until the next album, Master of Reality. Paranoid is in standard tuning.

http://www.metal-archives.com/reviews/B ... ConorFynes
" 'Embryo' is an eerie violin observation"
That's not a violin, it's way outside of the pitch range of a violin - in the range of a cello, which I have heard it referred to as, but the way it is played it makes sense that it is hybrid picked (pick+fingers) on an electric guitar tuned down to C#

http://www.metal-archives.com/reviews/B ... ConorFynes
This review barely says anything, but the album's title is "Vol. 4" not "Volume Four". There's also a bunch of errant capitalization. This also applied to the "Sabbath Bloody Sabbath" review, though I didn't spot any blatant factual errors.


Yeah, this is pretty bad, five reviews is enough. I recall that after someone commented on him titling reviews as "band - album", he changed his format. Perhaps if he reads this he will join us on the forums and take some feedback to improve on his writing. The enthusiasm is there, and there's quantity of writing, but not much quality.

Those are pretty nitpicky as far as factual errors go.

Well there was that one time he mentioned how the band he was reviewing covered "a band" named Mussorgsky. And then he attributed the totally wrong vocalist to Lykathea Aflame's lineup on Elvenefris...

See? Now those are noteworthy.

Sounds like a lot of oven fodder.



That's just what I picked out browsing five reviews...
While the errors themselves may not merit deletion, they're an indicator of the lack of quality, especially when half of every review is pretty much trying to recount the history of the band around that album. The validity of such a bare review is really brought into question when something as obvious as when Black Sabbath started downtuning is incorrectly attributed, it makes it seem like the writer is putting together a vague overview, rather than providing insights into each album.

Listen to the first minute of each of these songs and see what differences you notice. It's not hard to get it right.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QQBttKoetqo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9rihpED_obk

To be fair, Iommi lost his fingertips before the first album was recorded and he's said that that was the reason he started downtuning. I don't quite blame him for getting that one wrong if he doesn't play guitar or have an ear for that kind of thing.

Perhaps not everyone is qualified to be a good reviewer. The ability to differentiate between downtuned and standard guitars, for one, is quite essential for a quality metal reviewer. Secondly, a reviewer should be selfconscious of his ignorance. If he insists on making incorrect statements without doing as much as a google search to back up his information, there's no reason to forgive his ignorance.

Hey, I'm thinking and trying to become a reviewer and bring my fucked up style to MA. I made a blog yesterday, it's in my signature.

Not really.

Perhaps the lack of this knowledge can be excused by non-musicians if the reviewer doesn't insist on using the terms incorrectly. In ConorFynes' case, someone unfamiliar with Black Sabbath's earlier albums might be looking for the ones that did (or did not) have downtuned guitars. A quality reviewer should at very least be able to tell whether the guitars are in standard tuning or not.

Is this not an aspect worth to discuss in a box set than in a 'normal' one? It seems to be something worthy to bring up in some kind of comparison of releases or in terms of the evolution of a band.

That seems like a secondary trait to me. If they know the difference and can communicate that with others who are likewise familiar with standard tuning or whatnot, great. I don't see it as a huge loss if not.

it is not quite important for me as well. There's many kind of reviewers, I'm personnally not interested in discussing musical theory, I'd rather talk about something else, I'm not a musician myself and you don't need to be one to write a good review. To each his own.

Read one of your reviews! Not bad.

I don't like reviews by NausikaDalazBlindaz . They are way too long & his/her writing style is not that good.
I miss reviews by Five_Nails.

I've never before seen someone as talented as NausikaDalazBlindaz is at taking an artform as emotional and atmospheric as music, and managing to describe it in the most flat, boring, and unappealing way possible.

Have you ever read something from ConorFynes?

ConnorFynes, Nausikablablabla and CrimsonFloyd are the unholy trinity of bad reviewers.

If you think they're bad, you should look at mine.

Nausika has very strange taste. What do you find so bad about CrimsonFloyd? I've only read a few of his reviews, but don't remember seeing anything that horrible.

Agreed...ConnorFynes is among the worst reviewers....haven't read reviews by the other two..

CrimsonFloyd just rubs me the wrong way. His reviews aren't as terrible as the other two but he usually barely describes the music at all beyond two or three vague adjectives and has backwards opinions on everything.