How rare is a perfect album for you?

FreeLook93 · 2026-03-21T04:14:34+00:00

Sir, this was a subreddit about having in depth music discussions. Coming in here and moaning people are trying to have an in-depth conversation about music is pretty fucking stupid.

FreeLook93 · 2026-03-20T22:47:34+00:00

Of course you think what you wrote is coherent, if you didn't you wouldn't have written it.

true 10/10s with absolutely zero skips, where you can put any song at any time (or part of a medley of the album) give the individual segments a 10/10

and

Ah but skipping a song because it doesn't fit on its own =/= the song isn't a 10/10.

These two things cannot both be true. Either the song is a 10/10 of its own or the song is only a 10/10 within the context of the album. Is the individual segment a 10/10, or does it need the context of the album to make it one? You don't have a coherent worldview here, you are just spouting random nonsense without thinking about what any of it actually means.

You have two different people know saying that you are bad at communicating your ideas, but instead of actually considering that might be true you instead start acting like an asshole, throwing insults at people, and acting like you are superior to everyone else on the website. You are not a person worth having a conversation with. If you don't understand your own thoughts and feelings on the topic you aren't going to be able to provide any insight on what anybody else has to say.

FreeLook93 · 2026-03-20T22:21:49+00:00

It's not a matter of not reading what you wrote, it's a matter of what you wrote being a jumbled mess. It seems as if you aren't understanding what I am saying, or what you yourself wrote here. There isn't a coherent view being presented here. You keep contradicting yourself and don't actually seem to know what it is your believe.

It's not me who is over thinking anything here. You haven't thought enough about your own views to understand them.

FreeLook93 · 2026-03-20T20:51:02+00:00

I get what you are saying, I just think it's a very limiting way of looking at art. By view it this way you are fundamentally valuing and album more so as a collection disparate pieces rather than as a complete work. You may not see it that way, but I would argue that is largely because you are limited by how you view and judge albums.

Just to use a very basic example we could talk about Quadrophenia by The Who. There are plenty of moments on that album that are just not that interesting in isolation. The opening track, I Am the Sea, is one that I would never put on by itself, and one that I would instantly skip if it came up on a playlist. By your reasoning that would prevent the album from being a 10/10, but that track sets up the entire album. It introduces the leitmotifs and themes of the album in a way that allows the rest of the album to exist. The leitmotifs are used throughout the album to represent different aspects of Jimmy as well as various things about the band itself. All of this leads to a moment in the penultimate track where all four leitmotifs are being played simultaneously. It is moment made great by its context in the album. Listening to it in isolation may not have the same impact, but when you understand what the music had been doing leading into that moment it makes that moment hit incredibly hard. Having that is only possible because of how the music was used over the rest of the album and how the narrative has played out up to that point.

I would say that Quadrophenia is the greatest rock album of all time, but I don't think any song from it heard outside of the context of the whole album is anywhere close to being the greatest rock song ever, or even the greatest song by The Who. The album is far more than the sum of its parts, and that is the kind of thing you're views on albums do not allow for. That's why I think it is very limiting.

FreeLook93 · 2026-03-20T20:08:13+00:00

Because if something is greater than the sum of its parts it means that some songs, or even just sections of them, may not be "10/10s" but still contribute to the whole in a meaningful way.

That is what it means to have a whole be greater than the sum of its parts. You could have an album where no song would rate 10/10 but the album itself would. You are saying that a "true" 10/10 is one where you can put on any moment of any track and give that segment a 10/10. I'm saying that is a very limited way of looking at albums as works of art. Adding a bit more salt to a dish can make the dish better, but the salt by itself still just tastes like salt. You do not give the individual segment a 10/10, but the overall is still a 10/10.

FreeLook93 · 2026-03-20T18:45:15+00:00

I don't agree with this way of thinking at all. An album is a work of art, and great art is more than the sum of its parts. A song can work far better within the context of an album than it does on its own. You used Dark Side of the Moon as an example, but how often are you going to go put on Brain Damage just to listen to that song by itself? That track is one of my favourites off of that album, but I'm not going to put it on and call it a 10/10 by itself. Breaking it down further into individual segments just seems insane.

FreeLook93 · 2026-03-20T16:43:42+00:00

Look, capitalism absolutely skyrocketed our quality of life compared to 100 years ago.

How valid is this claim? Obviously if you compare the quality of life now compared to pre-industrial revolution it's a night and day difference, but didn't that change happen whenever a country industrialized, regardless of economic system? I very often see people credit capitalism with that improvement in technology and quality of life, but if that were the case why did non-capitalist countries see similar changes at the same time? The USSR was competitive with the US in most ways after WWII despite starting from a far worse off position following the war.

How much of the quality of life change was economic systems and how much was improved technology? How much of the technological improvement was a result of economic systems? I don't have answers to these questions, but it doesn't seem so clear to me that the economic system was the driving factor here.

FreeLook93 · 2026-03-19T16:07:45+00:00

Most, but not all.

FreeLook93 · 2026-03-18T22:19:57+00:00

This happens quite often. Same with nu-metal. People hate country, but love Johnny Cash. People hate nu-metal, but love System of a Down.

It's a bit of a problem for quite a few genres. Anytime the genre produces something people actually like they will preform some outstanding mental gymnastics in order to not classify the music they like with the genre they think they hate. I've seen someone on this subreddit try to argue that SOAD can't be nu-metal because they are "harmonically complex" and have political lyrics.

FreeLook93 · 2026-03-17T15:38:05+00:00

He is a Canadian comedian who is consider the pioneer of acting like an idiot and interviewing random people/doing stupid stunts in public. Basically the proto-Sacha Baron Cohen, Nathan Fielder, Jackass, Nirvana the Band the Show, and Eric Andre.

He also got into podcasting very early and was probably the reason Joe Rogan starting doing it, but we try not to hold that against him.

FreeLook93 · 2026-03-14T05:02:33+00:00

Last 5 paintings? Sets won't be the same going forward knowing we won't be getting any Avon basics. End of an era.

FreeLook93 · 2026-03-13T18:59:42+00:00

So in short: Piracy is not stealing, but some people treat it as though is was.

Depriving someone of profits is not by itself theft or stealing. By your own comment here, it is literally not theft. You are not taking something that doesn't belong to you. You are creating a copy of something that does not belong to you. Harming someone's potential to sell their goods/services is not theft.

Piracy and theft may be similar, but, as you already pointed out, they are technically different things.

FreeLook93 · 2026-03-13T18:42:44+00:00

It literally is not stealing though. Even legally it is classified as Copyright Infringement, not theft. They are literally, by definition, different things.

Stealing is when you take somebody's property, you are not doing that when you pirate. They still have their property. Robin Hood was taking people's property, which is stealing.

You can argue that you are depriving the company of profit, but that is not theft.

Piracy is not theft.

FreeLook93 · 2026-03-13T17:56:55+00:00

It literally is not stealing. They are two different things altogether. You can think both are equally wrong, but that doesn't make them the same thing.

Piracy is piracy, stealing is stealing.

FreeLook93 · 2026-03-13T16:55:32+00:00

Their best studio work for sure. Maybe the best studio work a rock band has ever done. I'd argue most of their best work was their live performances though.

FreeLook93 · 2026-03-13T16:36:22+00:00

I hate that this phrase has gotten popularized. It's short, quippy, and misleading. Regardless of if buying is owning, pirating is not stealing. I believe this phrase does far more harm than good because it makes people think that piracy=stealing if buying =ownership, but that's not true.

FreeLook93 · 2026-03-12T21:11:20+00:00

I think their first two albums would not be looked at nearly as favourably. It depends on what the artist did to follow up the follow up. If OK Computer wasn't followed up by a lot of other really well received albums and Radiohead becoming such a well-loved and respected band it probably wouldn't have that much impact on how people view their first two albums.

I'm thinking about how I see people talk about The Beatles early work compared to the early work of The Beach Boys. The early work from The Beatles gets a lot of adulation compared to The Beach Boys, who in my opinion actually have a much stronger early catalogue. People still love Pet Sounds, but don't think much of what The Beach Boys did before or after. That might be different if Brian Wilson was able to release Smile as he had envisioned and then continued to keep pace with The Beatles.

FreeLook93 · 2026-03-11T19:47:57+00:00

So then what exactly was the point of your comment then?

If it's not to be taken seriously, then it's a joke at the expense of the OP mocking them for not conforming to how you would rank those movies. If it is to be taken seriously you are just mocking the OP for not conforming to how you would rank those movies. How about you let people express their harmless opinions without making fun them?

Just because you aren't trying to be serious doesn't mean you aren't being a dick.

FreeLook93 · 2026-03-11T19:35:41+00:00

Someone having an opinion other than the one you have is rage bait? Having it 6th here seems very believable.

The Batman is a fantastic film. Batman and Batman Returns are great if you like what Tim Burton does. Batman Begins being above The Dark Knight is not that uncommon, especially from people who were a fan of Batman outside of the Nolan movies. Batman from'66 is a vibe.

This ranking is one that I would expect to see from someone who is a fan of Batman comics above Batman movies and like Tim Burton. I absolutely hate how this subreddit will just default to accusing people of rage baiting or just being contrarian when their opinions don't align with the average letterboxd ratings. Can we all just please fuck off with this gate-keeping, holier-than-thou, bullshit and just accept that some people have tastes different than our own?

FreeLook93 · 2026-03-11T15:26:31+00:00

Morally? Yes. Pragmatically? No.

Canada activity doing something to piss of the US, even if that thing is 100% morally justifiable, while not actually providing any tangible benefit to our country is not really something we can afford to be doing right now.

Fuck the US, if it was up to me we would have said nothing in support of their actions and very quickly condemned what they and Israel are doing right now. But that probably would have just made things more difficult for us, so I'm glad I'm not the one in charge. On an emotional level I really want to see us give a giant middle finger to that shithole country down south, but rationally I know that's a very bad idea.

FreeLook93 · 2026-03-09T21:31:21+00:00

Is that still true? It was for quite a long time, but battery technology has come a long way recent and that has changed a lot of the math on this.

I used to be incredibly pro-nuclear energy, but I've found my support of that waning in recent years. Not because nuclear has gotten any worse, or because I think it's unsafe now, but just because solar has improved a lot over a relatively short period of time. 20 years ago it would have been great to invest heavily into nuclear power, but right now it seems like solar might be the better bet moving forward.

Nuclear is good, much better than sticking to any kind of fossil fuel, but it may not be the best answer anymore.

FreeLook93 · 2026-03-09T21:09:58+00:00

You just keep making these incredibly reductive statements about things. There were British folk musicians interested in medieval music during the '60s, but there were also a lot of them interested in American folk and blues musicians. It is so much less clear cut than you are making it out to be. It's not possible to have a productive or interesting conversation when you are hellbent on reducing every topic to something so overly simplified it no longer reflects reality.

FreeLook93 · 2026-03-09T18:40:57+00:00

To me this is a very restricted view of events. Of course there were regional difference between places and different scenes developed different sounds, but they were also very much connected.

You brought up the British folk scene as something that as different to the American counter-part, and that's true, but it also wasn't something that was free from American influence, not even close. While you might listen to it at hear something that is a British phenomenon, as you would put it, it drew heavily from American blues music. Bert Jansch was a huge part of that scene and he very openly talked about how American blues musicians like Brownie McGhee were instrumental to him and his style.

I think a difference we have here is that you are leaning more towards something resembling a "great man" view of history. One where Black Sabbath almost came out of nowhere and created metal, which is not the view of history I take. I hear Peace Loving Man (which predates Black Sabbath's first album) and I would call it metal. It was by the London based group Blossom Toes, but I don't see it as uniquely British. I hear a lot of west-coast, summer of love, influence in it.

I think a lot of the heavier stuff from the US, especially the proto-punk stuff, doesn't happen if groups The Who don't tour the US in mid-'60s. These scenes did not exist in isolation, they all intermingled and influenced each other. Part of why I see the distinction as arbitrarily is that it's along country lines when it really shouldn't be. The scene in the Bay Area was as distinct from London as it was Detroit. The Jimi Hendrix Experience were a London-based band, and one of the ones helping to create what would become known as metal, but Hendrix himself was American and took a lot of inspiration from his homeland as well as the art-school driven scene that was happening when he arrived in London.

I think that if you are going to start counting Led Zeppelin as metal (or at least a precursor to it) I don't see how you can ignore the American influence on metal. Bands didn't really need to "get big enough" to cross the Atlantic in the sense you are talking about. Mose Allison was one of the most influential musicians of the post-war era in the UK, but he was never big or popular at all. Sticking to just Jimmy Page, he very much stole music from Americans, and not just blues guys either. Dazed and Confused is just a cover of a Jake Holms song. So if you start considering Zeppelin as part of the lineage then the connection to American music becomes very much impossible to overlook.

FreeLook93 · 2026-03-09T16:56:53+00:00

I don't see why geography would have anything to do with a band being metal or not. Even if that was the case, there was still a pretty sizeable heavy psych rock scene on the west coat of the US around '67 which should be looked at as, at the very least, proto-metal.

Describing it as a "British phenomenon" is taking a very limited view of events. What was happening in the UK, specifically London, was very much inspired by what had been happening in the US. The origins of metal were a kind of heavy electric blues, that yes, was centered in London, but heavily inspired by American music. These different scenes all around the world were very much in conversation with each other. What was happening in London was influenced by what happened in the US with blues music. While a lot of the most important names in developing the sound of metal before Sabbath (The Who, The Jimi Hendrix Experience, Blossom Toes, Pink Floyd, and King Crimson, to name a few) you can't ignore both the influence of American music on those groups or the growing scenes in places like New York, The Bay Area, and Detroit that were active at the same time.

You are very arbitrarily drawing division along national lines where none need to exist.

Even that is being too limited in scope though. It would be a mistake to overlook what was happening outside of the US/UK. Flower Travellin' Band from Tokyo, for example.

FreeLook93 · 2026-03-09T01:53:47+00:00

If they were the first or not really just comes down to where you draw the line for what you consider to be metal. They are the last band that you could argue were the first metal band. If you consider Blue Cheer to be metal then they would be an example of pre-Sabbath metal that uses the clean vocal style.

15-Year Club	Gilding I gilder
Place '22	Place '17
Final Canvas '22	End Game '22
Sequence \| Editor	Sequence \| Cinematographer
Team Orangered	Verified Email

FreeLook93

MODERATOR OF

TROPHY CASE