Hello. My name is Luke Shaffer. I am a freshman at Georgetown University studying business and music. I play guitar, write my own music, and analyze music. I have been rating albums for about a year now but only in my own documents and sheets. A friend recommended I blog my ratings and my opinions on different albums, and I thought it was a great idea so here I am. This is my first time every blogging and I am still navigating how to work the website, so please bear with me as I learn the ropes. Also, I don’t know why it says posted by: “mvrytrmy” because I did not make that name, but I already paid to use this platform and I cannot change it, so I guess it is staying. Lastly, as this is a hobby, I will not be taking a formal writing approach to this blog, but I will definitely make an effort to evolve as a writer and critic over time through this.
I am going to try to rate three to four albums a week but that could easily change depending on how busy/free I am. For my ratings, I have created a criterion that has gone through much revision over the past year. I think at this point the distribution of criteria is pretty solid in capturing all of the elements of the albums. I will explain and evaluate my criteria in another post. If at some point I think that the criteria are subject to change, then I will do so, and I am open to any questions or opinions regarding the criteria I use.
I will usually listen to an album anywhere between 2-6 times before writing a review on it so that I can fully understand and back my ratings up with evidence from specific songs and over-arching themes in the album. I choose albums predominately from bands that I enjoy listening to, and I also like to explore new artists on social media or through suggestions from friends. If you ever want me to a review an album, please do not hesitate to reach out!
I know that over time it is inevitable that I will have regrets in some of the scores I give because my perception of the scales for each criterion will evolve as I listen to more albums. When this happens, I will explain what in my opinion changed and how that will either change a score or one of the criteria. The hardest thing for me to do is compare the same criteria I have over different genres. I think that the criteria I have created does a good job covering all the musical and thematic components of an album; however, I have noticed that when comparing certain criterion over two albums of different genres that the purposes and constraints of said genre change my perception of what the criterion is trying to say about the album. A common example that I encounter is the lyrics/vocals criterion and how I have to look at different qualities in lyrics/vocals for rap albums compared to rock or indie albums, simply because the style, purpose, and meaning are completely different. I will do my best in adjusting my criterion across genres, and I will explain how I perceive the albums in certain criteria compared to others in my blogs.
Finally, I want to emphasize that my blogs are simply my opinion, and that there is no objectively right answer in evaluating music. People encounter music in multiple different ways that are unique to them, and through that people shape their opinions and music taste. I think that in today’s age people get too wounded up around their opinions on something that everyone should have a different perspective on in the first place. I am not claiming that my ratings are correct in any way, and I try to do a good job of combining what I objectively observe in the album and how much I enjoyed it, which I will explain more when I go over my criteria. I absolutely love to talk about music and would love to hear your opinions on any aspect of music or my ratings as it is always great to hear new perspectives. Please do not hesitate to reach me at my personal Gmail, [email protected]. Thank you for reading my blog and enjoy!