SwitSwat's Album Reviews
Welcome to my blog! It's nothing fancy, but I just wanted to put my small little hobby into effect somehow. Music has always been a passion of mine and while I don't have the credentials of a professional music critic or even experience in journalism, I still find it fun to talk about the albums I listen to and my personal thoughts on them. Obviously, I'm just a regular guy on the internet and my reviews are to be taken with a grain of salt. However, I myself find it refreshing to hear some fleshed out opinions on music from friends and family and not just the media, so I'm hoping a few of you will enjoy my "general public" take on these albums and enjoy the simplicity of it.
How to Navigate the Site
Seeing as this is a blog, of course all my posts will show up from most recent to oldest. That's obviously not a very effective means of finding specific artists, or albums that you want to read up on. There's a search bar at the top you can use to make navigating easier. I add tags to all my reviews so that you can search for them using any of these factors:
- Album Title
My Grading System
I like to use a typical letter grade scoring system, ranging from F- to A+ (E's are not included). It would probably help if I gave a rough explanation of what each letter grade means to me. So here they are:
A+ = This is pretty much my idea of a masterpiece. It doesn't necessarily mean that every song on the record takes my breath away, but rather every song is great and there is almost never a dull moment on the record.
A = An album that just missed the mark by mostly being an excellent album, but lacked that extra bit of "pizzazz" that a masterpiece would have.
A- = A great record that mostly keeps a consistent flow of quality. It may not exactly leave a big impact, but it's a very enjoyable record throughout.
B+ = This is a pretty good record. There may be a few songs that don't exactly meet the high standards set by the rest of the album, but I would rarely think that there's a "bad" song on here.
B = This is a very competent record that has its great moments, but falters at times, or maybe it's just a good album with no overbearing unique qualities.
B- = This is a good record that may simply lack a huge wow factor. Fans of said album's genre may very much enjoy this to a great extent.
C+ = A commendable effort that may still hold up well for fans of the genre, but it mostly falters for the rest.
C = An average record. You may start to find a few stinkers on here, but it balances out with a few other good tracks. Either that, or there wasn't anything particularly special about the album as a whole.
C- = A below average effort. Most of the album may just be filler or a handful of tracks drag down the momentum a bit for the rest of the already mediocre album.
D+ = At this point, I can't say that I would recommend an album that gets this score or lower for any reason. One begins to note a strong lack of innovation, creativity and or a sense of coherence.
D = I question why anyone would unironically buy this.
D- = I question why the artist bothered to make this.
F+ = I question the thought process behind releasing this record.
F = This is borderline noise. There's nothing redeemable about this record at all.
F- = If I ever give an album this score, then approach with caution, because this record could ruin your life.
With these scores in mind, it's important to note that just like everyone else out there, I have certain preferences when it comes to music genres. However, I still try to be objective when writing any reviews. Because of said preferences, however, an A record may not necessarily be something I would prefer listening to more than a certain A- record. The factors that come into play when deciding an album's score may fluctuate based on the genre. But with that said, please enjoy my simple reviews.
Consider donating to my patreon. It keeps me motivated to review music.
Consider donating to my patreon. It keeps me motivated to review music.
