Best Review Ever

StrangerInAStrangeLand

Ancient Mariner
(The following review of Master Of Puppets can be found here.)



The album that killed heavy metal - 0%
Written by UltraBoris on March 21st, 2004

It takes some DAMN GOOD reasoning to give this album such a low rating. The zero implies the absolute nadir of musicality, a level that can only be dreamt of by mere mortals as Fred Durst and your blender. What in Satan's name could this album have done to deserve such a low rating?? It pretty much singlehandedly ENDED heavy metal, that's what. Now, on a strictly musical level, I would give this album a 62 or so. It's not bad. It really isn't. It's certainly not as bad as Saint Anger, proud owner of a former record-low "3%" rating. It's not even as bad as the album that would follow it, And Justice for All, and when all is said and done, it pretty much sums up the averageness of the thrash movement perfectly.

First off, it is where shit really starts to fall apart for Metallica as a band. At this point, you can see the impending death - not just bodily, but creative as well. They are out of Mustaine riffs, and Hetfield isn't exactly the smartest, cleverest cookie in the box, and he's forced to scramble and improvise, so out comes one bashing thrasher, a few more assorted riffs here and there, and then all kinds of half-assed and half-baked ideas that pretty much do not belong in Heavy Metal, the land of the free, the home of the brave... unfortunately, the world caught on to THIS album, this expression of vapidity, and decided that THIS was the way to go.

This album is the Nirvana "Smells like Teen Spirit" of heavy metal. It brought heavy metal to its knees, and castrated it mightily. It is, then, by definition, the most damaging, counterproductive, and overrated LP ever to be released. Even standing it up on its own, and not letting it poison the minds of those that came after it, I wouldn't even put it in the top 10 most influential thrash releases of 1986... it's easily killed by the unholy trinity of Darkness Descends, Reign in Blood, and Pleasure to Kill, which pushed the envelope of metal in three different, related directions. It's not anywhere nearly as enjoyable as expatriate Mustaine's Peace Sells, which was technically brilliant and a whole barrel of fun too, or as dark as Possessed's sophomore effort, or Sepultura and Sodom's full-length debuts. It's not nearly as punk-as-fun as Nuclear Assault's first. Then I could throw in fifteen, if not fifty, other backwash thrash LPs that did nothing for the genre as far as influence goes, but are still a whole fuckload more enjoyable than this one.

So... the songs. There is some ownage here. Battery, for example, is fucking heavy, and works brilliantly well, as a destroyer of worlds. The title track is a bit more calculated, with its main riff gronked from one of the Metal Church demos (also "Over My Dead Body"), and but it dies for a bit in that little Hetfield noodle section in the middle. Say what you will, that part is dumb, and a harbringer of what is to come. Not just because it is dumb, but because it is hailed as visionary - not just on the album, but with this band, and with metal in general. This album didn't do ANYTHING make metal a better, more viable genre... hell, by 1986, everything that was good about metal was pretty much established, it was just a matter of time before all the stupid ideas reared their ugly fucking heads and turned the scene into self-parody. From the inane mindless riff-ennui of Jon Schaffer and Iced Earth, to the stupid dynamic mismanagement of a million bands, ranging from misplaced melodicism of the Gothenburg scene to the awful monotony of Opeth... all of these can be traced back to the vast commercial success of this album. Being "less than thrash" was viewed as a Good Thing. Less than over-the-top, less than expanding the genre, less than creative, less than heavy fucking metal. And of course, as is the human tendency to accept mediocrity, because excellence requires actual EFFORT... people jumped right on this very fucking album. They saw that they did not have to put out an all-out Bonded by Blood thrashfucking mindfuck, or even the complex harmonic beauty of stuff like Peace Sells, with its shredding solos and powerful interludes. If they just put in a obligatory Slow Solo Section, a la Suck Hetfield, they would be accepted as correct by their metal brethren. Rah, rah, put up the horns, thank you for being bland. A thousand Nevermores were spawned by THIS album.

Third song... this probably is the parodic equivalent of Black Sabbath here. Because Black Sabbath were midpaced, creative, and heavy. This is midpaced, boring, and plodding. There is nothing to this song, and of course, it would be viewed as a fucking staple of the "groove-thrash" movement. Robbb Flynnn, he whose contributions to excess are merely putting extra letters on the end of his first name, probably ejaculated twice as hard when he heard this song - and realised he could play shitty and get away with it - than in ANY other time of his life, and that includes his entire career in Vio-lence. This very well may be the song that spawned Machine Head, and of course when Hetfield, through the wall-of-saliva incident, corrupted Diamond Darrell into being a groove monkey, spawned modern Pantera too.

Next up, a cheesy ballad, Sanitarium, which again contains soft sections for the sake of having soft sections. Of course, proper use of dynamics had been completely, TOTALLY invented by about 1976... if Sabotage didn't have it, then Sad Wings certainly did, and anyone claiming to add something new to the idea was pretty much full of hot air. Maybe Rainbow's "Stargazer" can lay a small claim to things, a small claim to have added SOMETHING. And Sanitarum adds nothing. That said, it does not even play the standard cards correctly - there are tons of songs that start off soft and then build up to a frenzied crescendo, and most of them are far more effective than this. See Helstar's "Winds of War" for a perfect example, or even the previous LP's "Fade to Black" for one that works decently well. But of course, there is "Megalomania". And then there is this crap. And that's what this is - unmitigated crap, masquerading as thrash, but being plodding, boring, modern bullshit. This song has absolutely no balls whatsoever. And heavy metal is about BALLS. It's about riffs, it's about smashing a spike through the brains of the listener, making him/her/it perk up and die hard. It's about the slow, twisting zombie passages of Triumph of Death. It's about the flash and the colour and the violence of Chainsaw Charlie. It's about the constant multidirectional bludgeon of From the Past Comes the Storms. It's CERTAINLY NOT about Hetfield moaning "leave me be..." like a thousand other assrape victims to come. But, unfortunately, this is what the world caught onto. This is the illusion that destroyed reality, the feeble cry of patheticness in the night, that virally castrated a powerful genre. Because as Possessed and D.F.A. and up-and-coming bands like Death and Nocturnus were constantly playing loud, proud, and heavy and expanding the genre... and as a thousand other bands like Iron Maiden and Helloween were consistently waving the banner of Judas Fucking Priest... as all of those bands demonstrated vibrancy and life, here was THIS virus, this awful plague of self-mocking stupidity, that slowly corrupted the whole thing from within. And people wonder what happened to metal? People wonder why years like 1993 came along, and why horrendous, backwards bands like Lamb of God and Damage Plan are now on the forefront of the scene? People WONDER - no, it was inevitable, that the mediocrity would rise and destroy everything in its path. All it took was for the metal scene to be inundated with this backwash crap, this horrendous assault that seems so soothing, so relaxing... so "it's OKAY if you suck, junior", so Kurt Cobain before Kurt Cobain himself. Look, this band sucks too, and look at the instant popularity they have. Gresham's Law is a harsh mistress.

So yes, maybe I was mistaken. Maybe this is the album that should be lauded as the avant-garde of the metal scene of 1986. Forget Dark Angel's 286 beats per minute of ultimate heaviness, throw away Reign in Blood's chaotic assault on the senses, and certainly avoid thinking about Pleasure to Kill's death-metal tendencies. Oh no no, none of THOSE albums did jack shit for the metal genre, because the metal genre is OF COURSE about technological backwardsism, insipidity, and playing turned to "4", because only losers like Motorhead play, eat, drink, fuck, sleep, etc... on "11". Save the aggression for the Jager sessions, right Hetfield? The actual music needs to be a complete fucking lullaby. Horror of horrors - though mathematically inevitable of course - the metal genre ate this bullshit up. Again, look at the top bands in pop metal today... the uninspired Iced Earth, who have not had a good idea since 1994, of course proudly declare that early Metallica is their foremost influence. The godawful Machine Head, as mentioned before - groove-monkeys to the core. The lame Testament, who were, other than their lead guitarist, a few screw turns loose in the creativity department - their The New Order (a "thrash classic", my ass) is pretty much a fourth-rate Master of Puppets ripoff, and their latest stuff takes ideas that were more heavily present on this LP, and less so on others.

Fifth up is Disposable Heroes, eight minutes of thrash, showing that, if pressed, the band could still deliver the goods. This, along with Battery, is the highlight of the album. It's competent thrash a la 1984 or 1985, except maybe a bit overlong. That said, if you think this has crushing riffage, you have not heard Exodus's Piranha. Again, if the album were all like this, then it would be an average thrasher, not unlike a thousand others that came out in this year. See Death Angel's "The Ultraviolence" for a quick example. Following Disposable Heroes is the clearly Mustaine-written - at least, in the interesting parts, anyway - Leper Messiah. That middle break is so completely Killing/Peace Sells that the fact that Hetfield could even barely begin to claim that he and Ulrich wrote the song is promptly ludicrous, and more so a flat out fucking lie. I can see Hetfield writing the plodding, Should Not Be-esque beginning and end of the song, but that middle section has the Mark of Dave. I have no idea how this band managed to assign songwriting credits, but the idea of Ulrich coming up with songs is laughable. It is this little fucking troll that can personally be shown to be the anti-metal figure. No, not just because of Napster. Not because of the black album, and Bob Rock, and a thousand other crimes against humanity in the 1990s. He had a hand on THIS album too. Hetfield, by himself, would probably been happy penning silly odes to bludgeonry, a thousand Batteries, each with a slightly lower voltage than the last, and the band would have died its appropriate death by mediocrity. Kublai Khan, anyone? No one's heard of Kublai Khan, and no one should have ever heard of Metallica after 1984 or so. They just got incredibly lucky that Ulrich got kicked out of Metal Church in 1980, and had nothing to do with the east coast scene, where Overkill was busy declaring that they just didn't give a fuck. They just wanted to play live, and repeatedly they compromised their good business sense to continue doing so. Quite a sad thing, that Overkill shot themselves in the face with their selling of their demo to Azra Records for booze money, but when all is said and done, THAT attitude is BY FAR more The Metal Way than anything Metallica could have done. Overkill didn't give a fuck, and just played cranked to 11, finishing their set with Tyrant, and recognising Joey Ramone and Lemmy Kilmister as the twin gods of excess and everything that is right and "fuck yeah!" about the world. Then, there was Megadeth, with Mustaine, who instantly, at the very moment the band was founded, or maybe even before then... when Mustaine was sent back to San Francisco on that four-day bus trip, THAT is when Megadeth became a better band than Metallica would ever be, because Mustaine was right pissed off, and he would outdo, outgun, and outriff the band that had jilted him, because that is the metal way, to be over-the-top and full of dashing creative energy.

Metallica had none of this. Maybe, at the beginning, they had whatever they could steal from their Venom and Diamond Head LPs. Unfortunately, Hetfield probably had his heart in the right place, but he was a complete fucking pussy. He felt the need to declare between songs in 1985 that he would not be saying the words "ooh baby" and wearing lipstick. Paul Baloff took the battle to the other side, issuing an ultimatum to anyone in the crowd wearing a RATT shirt. Bobby Blitz just didn't even mention it, letting the songs do the talking. He was "leaving the poseurs behind". Hetfield just stood on the stage and sulked, because Ulrich was busy cutting his heart out. Ulrich, who had not a whit of songwriting sense to him... he was kicked out of Metal Church in '80 because his drumming was nonexistent at best. He of course had the spark of marketing, where he landed himself a deal on a compilation without a band, or anything other than flyers of Saxon at the Whiskey. And he knew, that the way to make it to the top was not the way of Possessed, because Possessed were too heavy and too rough to be anything but a cult band. He knew that the way to the top was to scheme and to cover one's self in a heavy dose of bullshit. Then, he got lucky, because he had a pal named Hetfield, that really wanted to kill all the record label executives, and combine Hetfield's true extravagance with Ulrich's poseurism, and what you got was a band that appeared to be rebellious. Throw in Cliff Burton's hippie tendencies, and Kirk Hammett's irrelevance, and the image was complete. And at the beginning, the band did have the metal madness, when they wrote silly odes to Weapon like Hit the Lights - empty of social relevance, but completely heavy FUCKING metal. Thanks, Hetfield and Tanner. It's not hard to be a metal kid, and at the beginning, Hetfield was a metal kid. Then Ulrich slowly but surely turned him into a puppet. The album title can be viewed as a proud declaration of Ulrich's conquest of Hetfield, of Metallica, and eventually of the entire scene. The little troll infused mediocrity, and slowly burned the world from the inside out. Hetfield became a raging alcoholic, hanging on to whatever riffs he could remember stealing from Mustaine. Burton's hippie-rock, which was fine for what it is, but had no place in metal whatsoever, soon became the overriding creative force in the band, and of course had to be recognised, because Ulrich knew that if he approved another Hell Awaits, the scene would bury him fast. And of course, it would be ludicrous to imply that he was one-ten-thousandth the drummer the Lombardo was.

So along came Master of Puppets. Random hippie crap, combined with a few random recycled Mustaine moments, all held together by the glue of Hetfield's average riff constructions - perfectly suitable for an average, mediocre, fifth-rate garage thrash ensemble. And Ulrich's megalomania, that realised that this steaming pile of directionless garbage was THE universal solution to bringing him fame. Not that it was any good - precisely because it WASN'T. Because it was mediocre, any idiot with an axe could be like Hetfield now, and if Ride the Lightning sold a whole fuckload of copies, then Master of Puppets, on inertia alone, would sell a whole fuckload more, and thus the seed was set. And that, my friends, is why Lars Ulrich is the worst thing ever to happen to heavy fucking metal.

After the obligatory Mustaine composition comes the long section of hippie crap, that is not only the worst song on the album, but THE final stake through the heart of heavy metal. I hear Orion, and I hear Opeth. I hear a heap of shit that is labelled "progressive" and "visionary", but is really a space-filler. A throwback to the 1960s and the 1970s - stuff that Black Sabbath quickly moved away from, and used only in small amounts. Progressive rock was dangerous stuff, to be used in form only, not in actual substance. Careful with it, and get brilliant stuff like The Writ. Too much results in Fluff. And Iommi was smart to recognise this, but Cliff Burton was not. And he continued to write songs full of this dreck. Ask Hetfield to throw on a few random metal riffs, and what you get is something claimed as "amazing" by all the losers that would also claim In Flames as a masterwork of a band. Of course, this anthem to loserhood has no heart whatsoever, no spirit, no emotional content. Nothing. Thunderhead, this is not. Stargazer? Fuck no. Certainly not anything out of the Diamond Head catalogue. Not Am I Evil, To the Devil His Due, or even Ishmael. Diamond Head got it right, and despite the endless stream of pointers from Lars to their general direction, Metallica did not. But of course, it is easier to derive inspiration from the half-baked. Easy to look at what did not get it right, and claim that to be the best thing ever, simply so that when you make something similar, you can pat yourself on the back and be proud. Thus, Dark Tranquillity, be proud. You sound like complete shit, and have the intensity of zero point zero Iommis, and you are hailed as an excellent modern band. Because you took the Orion approach to things. So, Dark Tranquillity, make sure to send Lars a Christmas card once a year, because you owe your entire career to him. So many bands nowadays do. So many bands would never have gotten off the ground, if "getting off the ground" were not so kindly redefined as "flopping right over and accomplishing nothing" a la Orion.

Then, the last song. Damage Incorporated is the last of Hetfield's contributions to the album... fast and completely insipid. This is not, in any way, shape, or form, to be mistaken for The Burning of Sodom. This is James Hetfield's dying cry as Lars Ulrich finishes him off. In fact, if you look carefully, you can see the exact frame where his heart rips in two. Desperation breeds stupidity, and here is the final desperate act of a man driven to Jagermeister, not because of the grueling tribulations of the road, or of having one's equipment stolen, or because he had to send an ex-guitarist back to the west coast in a box on wheels. It's the final death of a man that thinks he is on top of the world, being the frontman of the most famous heavy metal band in existence... but slowly, subconsciously, realising he is not at all in control, and knowing that he's going to have to put on a smiling bullshit face for however many years, because he certainly can't QUIT the band, but the only way to stay in is to submit to Lars Ulrich, despite all of their public assurances that they are partners in crime. Hetfield is weak, and resorts to over-the-top boasting. Most thrash bands would, of course, do something like this, but somehow none of the Overkill catalogue comes off nearly this pathetic, this fake, this... incorporated. Overkill are rotten to the core in the best sense of the word... Metallica in the worst, most corporate. And at the head of this machine is the midget himself, Lars Ulrich. He holds the world in his hands... his band, his "music", his scene.

Best not to listen, kids. If you have any decency, any individuality, any self-respect. THIS is why I gave the album a zero, because it is the album that will slowly draw you in and destroy you too. Let this be your warning.

"Master of puppets, I'm pulling your strings..."





Now, I know most of you actually like this album, so...Discuss. ; )
 
That "UltraBoris" is a stupid fucking jackass. I can understand if you don't like this album, but to give it a 0% is just ridiculous. Master of Puppets is a great album, though overated. Just listening to the music itself is great, but there are also the excellent lyrics.

Edit: He even said himself that he thought Battery sounded good. That should give it AT LEAST a 1%.
 
Given the fact that the vast majority of people who have heard Master Of Puppets have liked it, I am forced to conclude that one of the following is true:

1. The reviewer is a complete idiot.

2. The reviewer purposely wrote a flamebait review just to get on the nerves of any intelligent reader.

(Note that both of the above could be true, and probably are.)

In either case, this review isn't worthy of comment; it is better off ignored.
 
I simply stopped reading after he called Opeth "monotonous"... I thought the first requirement for writing reviews was TO KNOW WHAT YOU ARE TALKING ABOUT.
 
It seems that the legendary Ultraboris has upset some more people, nothing new there. I somehow predicted that this review would be on this topic of discussion. It has got quite a status over in the metal archives. You can check out Ultraboris' superb musical talent here. Just don't get riled up, he's little more than a novelty act. [img src=\"style_emoticons/[#EMO_DIR#]/wink.gif\" style=\"vertical-align:middle\" emoid=\";)\" border=\"0\" alt=\"wink.gif\" /] Although he is right about the fact that Machine Head are garbage. [img src=\"style_emoticons/[#EMO_DIR#]/sleep.gif\" style=\"vertical-align:middle\" emoid=\"-_-\" border=\"0\" alt=\"sleep.gif\" /]
 
Perun has pointed out this review before and as we have said, this is complete BS. He actually says that he gives the album a rating of 62 for the musical value. The "0" that he actually gave is for the influence that the album had on all generic thrash/metalcore/groove metal bands who cited this as an influence.

The guy must be forgetting that a whole stack of good metal bands also cited this as an influence and in reality this is one of the best metal albums of all time [img src=\"style_emoticons/[#EMO_DIR#]/cool.gif\" style=\"vertical-align:middle\" emoid=\"B)\" border=\"0\" alt=\"cool.gif\" /]

The guy just overlooked that fact because he wants to be controversial and he has achieved his aim [img src=\"style_emoticons/[#EMO_DIR#]/tongue.gif\" style=\"vertical-align:middle\" emoid=\":p\" border=\"0\" alt=\"tongue.gif\" /] We are discussing him after all, aren't we?
 
[!--quoteo(post=133552:date=Mar 31 2006, 05:54 PM:name=Conor)--][div class=\'quotetop\']QUOTE(Conor @ Mar 31 2006, 05:54 PM) [snapback]133552[/snapback][/div][div class=\'quotemain\'][!--quotec--]
Perun has pointed out this review before
[/quote]

Uhm... no, I pointed out another review from the Metal Archives about a Maiden album written by some unknowing prat. You must be confusing something here.
 
[!--quoteo(post=133552:date=Mar 31 2006, 08:54 AM:name=Conor)--][div class=\'quotetop\']QUOTE(Conor @ Mar 31 2006, 08:54 AM) [snapback]133552[/snapback][/div][div class=\'quotemain\'][!--quotec--]
...he wants to be controversial and he has achieved his aim [img src=\"style_emoticons/[#EMO_DIR#]/tongue.gif\" style=\"vertical-align:middle\" emoid=\":p\" border=\"0\" alt=\"tongue.gif\" /] We are discussing him after all, aren't we?
[/quote]
That's why I said this entire thing is better off ignored.

Seriously - isn't there anything better to discuss?
 
[!--quoteo(post=133588:date=Mar 31 2006, 08:25 PM:name=Perun)--][div class=\'quotetop\']QUOTE(Perun @ Mar 31 2006, 08:25 PM) [snapback]133588[/snapback][/div][div class=\'quotemain\'][!--quotec--]
Uhm... no, I pointed out another review from the Metal Archives about a Maiden album written by some unknowing prat. You must be confusing something here.
[/quote]
Somebody on these forums definitley pointed out a link to this before. I thought it was you but it must have been somebody else, possibly Onhell, Black Dragon or SMX [img src=\"style_emoticons/[#EMO_DIR#]/wink.gif\" style=\"vertical-align:middle\" emoid=\";)\" border=\"0\" alt=\"wink.gif\" /]
 
How about this review?

Hello Recycling Bin! - 12%
Written by Falconsbane on May 18th, 2005


If you asked the average metalhead to name the landmark releases in metal history, chances are, Iron Maiden's "The Number of the Beast" would make the list. Of course, the average metalhead would be hard pressed to come up with a room temperature IQ at the North Pole, so we would probably do better better to ignore such opinions. In truth, "The Number of the Beast" marked Iron Maiden's descent into self-parody, a trend that would only get worse with each subsequent album. Even the addition of the incomparable Bruce Dickinson on lead vocals is not enough to cover up the album's glaring flaws.

"The Number of the Beast" is the first Maiden album to display Steve Harris' mature writing style, and by "mature" I mean this is the first album where Steve figured out he didn't actually have to write new songs to impress his brain dead fanbase. Accordingly, "The Number of the Beast" consists of "Hallowed be Thy Name," "22 Acacia Avenue" and one other song repeated seven times. While it is true that the former remains one of the more brilliant pieces of songwriting to emerge from the NWOBHM movement it in no way compensates for the miserable quality of the rest of the album. It is a tribute to the greatness of Bruce Dickinson that he is able to rise above such mediocre material to lend a certain anthemic urgency to otherwise DOA songs like "Run to the Hills" and "Invaders," but even he can's save absolute dreck like the unbearably cheesy title track.

"The Number of the Beast" is also notable for its introduction of a basic approach to mixing and production that would help sap the life from the band's music for the next two decades. The vocals are pulled forward (good idea, as Dickinson was clearly the best thing the band had going from them), but so is the bass. The latter is annoyingly up front, for reasons that probably have to do with Steve Harris' massive (and largely unearned) ego. That this self-indulgence comes at the expense of an adequate guitar sound is unforgivable, and it is a clear sign of just who was responsible for turning Iron Maiden into the most boring and predictable band in heavy metal.

You may commence the barrage of comments.
 
Can we PLEASE STOP posting these reviews. I already think that people (in general) are stupid, and this definetly isn't helping. This is why I don't go on websites like that. People have different views on things, so just because they think an album is excellent dosen't mean I will. If I saw a review like that before I ever heard an Iron Maiden song I probably would have said that they sucked, even though I never heard them, just because some jackass told me they did. Stop acting like jackasses and just listen to the music and keep your opinions to yourself because I DON'T CARE WHAT YOU THINK.
 
[!--quoteo(post=133639:date=Apr 1 2006, 03:10 AM:name=Child of the Grave)--][div class=\'quotetop\']QUOTE(Child of the Grave @ Apr 1 2006, 03:10 AM) [snapback]133639[/snapback][/div][div class=\'quotemain\'][!--quotec--]
If I saw a review like that before I ever heard an Iron Maiden song I probably would have said that they sucked, even though I never heard them, just because some jackass told me they did.
[/quote]

That seems like a really stupid thing to do....


[!--quoteo(post=133639:date=Apr 1 2006, 03:10 AM:name=Child of the Grave)--][div class=\'quotetop\']QUOTE(Child of the Grave @ Apr 1 2006, 03:10 AM) [snapback]133639[/snapback][/div][div class=\'quotemain\'][!--quotec--]
Stop acting like jackasses and just listen to the music and keep your opinions to yourself because I DON'T CARE WHAT YOU THINK.
[/quote]

I thought forums were for discussing? ::
 
Ahh, good old UltraBoris. He's one of those reviewers who'll give an album <50% if more than 500 people have heard of it. Strangely, though, he gave quite a few Iced Earth albums decent rankings, especially Night of the Stormrider, which got 90%. He also hates Opeth, if you've seen any of his reviews. But since he seems to have taken shots at every band I like in that review, I won't put much store by what he says. After all, so called 'hardcore' metalheads like him are ten-a-penny nowadays. His one decent review was that of Unleashed in the East (Judas Priest), which got 100% from him....
....it was also a bootleg with additional tracks, and not the proper published version. Does anyone else detect the scent of a 'tilter' in the rankings?

The trouble with MetalArchives is, you can't judge by the reviews there. One the one hand there will be people who will give a good album a deservingly good score. Then, people like UltraBoris see that the album is getting popular and call it 'overrated', promptly giving it ridiculously low scores in order to drag the score down. And it only takes two or three of these self-righteous gits to hand out single-digit ratings before the album has an average rating of about 30%. In my opinion, if it doesn't make you throw up or force you to switch it off before the first listen, it shud get at least 40%-it's music, and enjoyable. But then, I'm probably too much of a poseur, according to Boris ::
 
Um... he gave Powerslave and 7th Son 99% and more than 500 people have heard of Maiden so that claim of yours is unfounded. But yes, he is just a thrash metal purist, what makes him so special that we all have to talk about him like this? ::
 
pfft I don't think 7th son deserves even a 79%... why do people like it so much? Seriously.
 
[!--quoteo(post=134508:date=Apr 10 2006, 06:09 PM:name=Black Dragon)--][div class=\'quotetop\']QUOTE(Black Dragon @ Apr 10 2006, 06:09 PM) [snapback]134508[/snapback][/div][div class=\'quotemain\'][!--quotec--]
Um... he gave Powerslave and 7th Son 99% and more than 500 people have heard of Maiden so that claim of yours is unfounded. But yes, he is just a thrash metal purist, what makes him so special that we all have to talk about him like this? ::
[/quote]

My bad. I read through some of his other reviews and realised I had mislabelled him. From his reviews of In Flames, Dark Tranquillity and Metallica, I had put him down as an elitist, when in fact he's actually more of an extremely-hard-to-please old-school thrash fanboy. He's still highly biased, as are quite a few reviewers on there. Rule of thumb: If they have a really low rating and start off in the first paragraph by frequently insulting the band (especially their name; 'In Suck' 'Sucktallica' and 'Suckbid Angel' being examples [img src=\"style_emoticons/[#EMO_DIR#]/wink.gif\" style=\"vertical-align:middle\" emoid=\";)\" border=\"0\" alt=\"wink.gif\" /] ) and have roughly two swearwords per sentence (notice they will never think up new swearwords; they always stick to a favourite-Boris' is 'suck', in case you hadn't guessed), you might as well stop reading-they're really just whining about the album and don't have any constructive criticism to pass on about it. That said, I also hate the people who hand out 95+ ratings without any real reason for doing so-they have really short reviews and don't bother to take any possible flaws into account. You really can't win *sigh*
 
[!--quoteo(post=135385:date=Apr 21 2006, 06:38 PM:name=Silky)--][div class=\'quotetop\']QUOTE(Silky @ Apr 21 2006, 06:38 PM) [snapback]135385[/snapback][/div][div class=\'quotemain\'][!--quotec--]
My bad. I read through some of his other reviews and realised I had mislabelled him. From his reviews of In Flames, Dark Tranquillity and Metallica, I had put him down as an elitist, when in fact he's actually more of an extremely-hard-to-please old-school thrash fanboy. He's still highly biased, as are quite a few reviewers on there. Rule of thumb: If they have a really low rating and start off in the first paragraph by frequently insulting the band (especially their name; 'In Suck' 'Sucktallica' and 'Suckbid Angel' being examples [img src=\"style_emoticons/[#EMO_DIR#]/wink.gif\" style=\"vertical-align:middle\" emoid=\";)\" border=\"0\" alt=\"wink.gif\" /] ) and have roughly two swearwords per sentence (notice they will never think up new swearwords; they always stick to a favourite-Boris' is 'suck', in case you hadn't guessed), you might as well stop reading-they're really just whining about the album and don't have any constructive criticism to pass on about it. That said, I also hate the people who hand out 95+ ratings without any real reason for doing so-they have really short reviews and don't bother to take any possible flaws into account. You really can't win *sigh*
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*sigh* If only my reviews ever got accepted. So far I've had two rejections for really petty reasons ::
As for your statement of criticising bands by using swear words, that reminds me of some crazy reviewer who called "The Duellists" flabby [img src=\"style_emoticons/[#EMO_DIR#]/tongue.gif\" style=\"vertical-align:middle\" emoid=\":p\" border=\"0\" alt=\"tongue.gif\" /]
 
[!--quoteo(post=135432:date=Apr 22 2006, 12:26 PM:name=Conor)--][div class=\'quotetop\']QUOTE(Conor @ Apr 22 2006, 12:26 PM) [snapback]135432[/snapback][/div][div class=\'quotemain\'][!--quotec--]
*sigh* If only my reviews ever got accepted. So far I've had two rejections for really petty reasons ::
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What are these 'petty reasons'?
 
[!--quoteo(post=135569:date=Apr 24 2006, 08:53 PM:name=Ascendancy)--][div class=\'quotetop\']QUOTE(Ascendancy @ Apr 24 2006, 08:53 PM) [snapback]135569[/snapback][/div][div class=\'quotemain\'][!--quotec--]
What are these 'petty reasons'?
[/quote]Apparantly my review of Powerslave was like "flogging a dead horse".
I had posted a review of Dragonforce - Sonic Firestorm on a forum and accidentally left a smilie in the text and then the mod at the metal archives rejected it for neglegence or something.

Another couple of reviews were similar to Powerslave in that too many people had reviewed it and there was no point in putting up basically the same thing. Petty [img src=\"style_emoticons/[#EMO_DIR#]/tongue.gif\" style=\"vertical-align:middle\" emoid=\":p\" border=\"0\" alt=\"tongue.gif\" /]
 
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