discussion How do you rate an album?

[Curaga]

How do you rate an album on a scale of 1 to 10?
Discuss and/or answer the prompts!

Don't feel like you have to answer every prompt.

 

1. Do you have criteria that an album has to meet for a certain score, or is it more nebulous than that?

 

2. Is it enough to like every song on an album or does it need a certain "it" factor too to be 10/10?

3. Does an album's success as an era contribute to its rating? (hit singles, music videos, release schedule, etc.)

 

4. Do you pay more attention to lyrics, vocals, instrumentals, hooks/catchiness, or something else?

 

5. Do you consider an album's context when rating? (released before/after certain trends, released during a certain political climate/wartime, etc.)

 

 

Inspired by the top 100 albums rate thread:

https://atrl.net/forums/topic/477325-atrls-best-albums-of-all-time-top-100-results-page-1/

 

[NEX]

Every album starts with a theoretical score of 10/10 for me. And then it starts losing points for various shortcomings like: production, lyrics, instrumentation, melodic strength, cohesiveness, duration, the amount of filler etc etc. Very very few albums ever get close to 9.5 or let alone 10 for me as a result. 

[Gladiator]

How many songs I love or resonate with / Total songs on the album

 

If I like 100% of the songs, its a 10/10.

Math determines the rest.

 

I will give grace rating to some albums if I can see myself liking a song I didn't on initial listen with more exposure to it.

 

I really only discredit it for songs I dislike enough that I don't foresee me moving past it with more listens.

Edited August 22 by Gladiator

[Curaga]

1. I have some real basic criteria: for an average rating, there has to be at least one song I like enough that I want to listen to it again or regularly, and for 10/10 I have to love every song. I mostly consider the number of liked songs out of total songs.

 

2. I think there's an "it" factor for me. Just because every song is likable with no skips doesn't necessarily make it a 10 for me. I need it to be a whole album experience start to finish, great visuals, etc., not just "Ten Great Random Songs".

 

3. I could still fall in love with an album and think it's 10/10 without being there for the experience of the era, and I don't care about commercial success, but it definitely adds sentimental value when you get to experience a fun rollout firsthand (e.g., Electra Heart's tumblr posts, Brat's general iconicness recently)

 

4. I definitely pay more attention to the vocals and the instrumentals: I care most about how it sounds at the end of the day. Of course, clever or relatable lyrics elevate a song or can even make me like a song I didn't like at first. 

 

5. In general, I don't think about the context at all  I just want the music to be good and timeless.

[UnusualBoy]

I do it based on how many songs I like and how much I like them compared to the song I didn't like.

[PaloSanto]

I usually rank/rate two ways: soft and hard.

 

Soft is based on vibes and basically goes: want to replay album (even if I wasnt slayn by it), wouldnt listen again and stopped and didnt finish it cause it wasnt my cup of tea.

 

hard system i give each song a rate 1 to 10. 10 being the best song on the album and the rest gets ranked using that measure. I usually only do this for albums I really love or for my favorite artists discographies in a way to determine for myself my favorite albums by them or the ones Id consider their best.

[West Coast]

4 minutes ago, PaloSanto said:

I usually rank/rate two ways: soft and hard.

 

Soft is based on vibes and basically goes: want to replay album (even if I wasnt slayn by it), wouldnt listen again and stopped and didnt finish it cause it wasnt my cup of tea.

 

hard system i give each song a rate 1 to 10. 10 being the best song on the album and the rest gets ranked using that measure. I usually only do this for albums I really love or for my favorite artists discographies in a way to determine for myself my favorite albums by them or the ones Id consider their best.

rate me hard and soft

 

[EnigmaticAndroid]

It's a mix of things. Generally, I try to rate albums (and art in general) against how well they achieve what they set out to do. But at the same time, art that is ambitious, boundary-pushing, or legitimately experimental is less likely to be 100% perfect than music that plays it very safe. For instance, there's a good chunk of AC music that is objectively well-done on a technical level but does nothing for me because it feels like a retread and stale. Stuff is only a 9 or a 10 for me if it stands out as a body of work in a significant way or genuinely borders on being flawless.

[Loca]

I rate albums simply based on the good old reliable vibes. I don't have a theoretical relation with music and developing a critical approach for it seems like a waste of time. 

Edited August 22 by Loca

[Wicked]

Liking every song =/= a 10/10 for me, there's varying degrees of liking something. An album with only songs I think are good is a good album, not a great, amazing or theoretically 'perfect' one.

 

It just comes down to how I feel about it as a whole after listening. 

[ChooseyLover]

I used to rate each song individually and do an arithmetic mean. But looking back I don't like that.

 

If I went on to rate albums now I'd give that arithmetic mean a 70% value of the score and the remaining 30% to the cohesiveness, either achieved by a recurrent lyrical theme, interludes, transitions from one song to another or a very characteristic/defining production that works as common thread. A playlist kind of album shouldn't get a score above 7/10.

[playboi]

I use rym and individually rate every track on a scale from 0,5 to 5 then I give the album an average rating based on that 

[Contessa]

Nebulous. It's purely based on my enjoyment of the album. Which is really the way ppl should be rating something as subjective as music and even movies tbh.

[Suilen]

As a rule, I don't really rate albums, partially because I'm a song person deep inside (I still try to consume albums as a full body of work, but it's songs I return to, rarely entire albums), and partially because I lack the musical knowledge to do so. If I have to rank my favorite albums of all time or top albums from a particular year, I suppose I'll rely on my overall enjoyment, the number of plays on last.fm and the impact they've had on me. But all it's all arbitrary, and sometimes I may rank an album high simply because it's interesting or has something to say even though I played it once or twice.

 

If I had to rate my favorite albums, for example, I wouldn't give most of them 10/10 because there's always a song or two I don't care for. And even if I like all the songs, something else could be amiss. The same is true for other media - I don't think that my favorite video games of all time are necessarily 10/10 or belong to the best of all time lists. As for anime/manga/books, I tend to rate those things based on my enjoyment even though I'm technically aware of the factors that make a book 'good', for instance. Sometimes I enjoy good stuff, sometimes I enjoy bad stuff. 

 

Generally, I pay attention to the instrumental part, the vocals and the overall production. Great vocals may save a song (or an album) that's otherwise boring. The lyrics... I only really pay attention to them in my native language, and it's a mixed bag. I'm so used to listening to music in languages I don't know that it doesn't matter, though particularly bad lyrics do affect my enjoyment of a song. It's not uncommon that when I end up learning a language and revisit some songs in the said language, the lyrics turn out to be quite terrible. Maybe knowledge isn't inherently good.

 

Chart success wouldn't have any bearing on my potential score, at least in a positive way. But... if an album is successful and has a lot of hype surrounding it, and you listen to it, and it's not all that, well, that may have a negative effect due to your disappointment. The context seems important on paper, but it only works for an album that's already good, the cherry on the cake. I'm not a big fan of Namie's SWEET 19 BLUES and Utada's First Love, but those albums had a tremendous impact on the industry. I'm not going to give them higher scores just because of that, though I can still acknowledge their influence separately.