Nota: Escribiré en inglés en este recuadro ya que daré por entendido que es el idioma que todo el mundo sabe leer.

INTERESTING FACTS FOR NEW VISITORS ("interesting" in the "not interesting at all" sense)

(No particular order)

#1 I write randomly some reviews in spanish and some reviews in english. I'll tag them according to their language.

#2 If you see I give singles worse ratings than the ones I give to albums, there's a simple explanation for that: I try not to listen to albums I know that will be dreadful, because they would suck the life out of me, but it's not such a big deal to listen to a bad single, so I check them just in case.

#3 I am one of those creepy guys who believe music quality is objective (although I don't like using those words. They are meaningless). To avoid misunderstandings, I'll define that stating the "musical quality of a certain piece X" is just another way of stating the artist's merit for creating X. It should be read like that, and no other meaning is valid. What amazes me is how is it possible that many people still try to insist that the discussion is about a "thing", named musical quality, and whether it is "objective" or not (whatever "being objective" means). That's nonsensical. If you believe Revolver isn't objectively better than "Stupic Hoe", then you do not believe Revolver is better than "Stupid Hoe" at all, or at least not in a sense that has any meaning. The proper discussion is about whether we can judge the merit of musical creation or not. If you're looking for a way to measure that merit, I can't give you a definitive answer, but I've always had the ridiculous belief that understanding something is good is equivalent to acknowledging that it is not the result of someone throwing a dice. According to this, the quality of a certain musical piece is related, in an inverse proportion, to its entropy! With all this palaver, of course, I don't mean I believe I am more likely to be right than any idiot on this site. I'm just another person, gosh!

#4 People who ignore completely the concept of "cognitive bias" and take every "you're wrong" argument as a personal attack (or as an accusation of being a liar) are the worst. I'm not trying to suggest everybody to go around yelling at everyone "You fools don't actually like this music as much you pretend to do!" just because they like something you don't. I'm just trying to remind you people: cognitive biases are a thing and they led you to passionately believe things that you don't actually have rational reasons to defend. I'm open for people suggesting me that I sometimes fool myself about stuff. Hell, I don't even know what my 5's would look like if I had never tried to be honest with myself. I would still be overrating many acts that now I recognize are lame. It takes time, and it is hard, but it is possible. I'm just tired that cognitive biases are things that are widely accepted to exist almost everywhere outside RYM (modern capitalist societies are built around the manipulation of consumers through cognitive biases) but when someone brings the topic on the boards everyone takes it as an offense. The next time someone says "you only like artist X for Y reason" do not take it as a personal attack. If you know he's wrong then pay him no mind. He's just wrong and that's it. Still, (my point is) you have to be open for criticism and psychological analysis, even when 90% of the time it's completely innacurate.

#5 Problably I've not given multiple listens to half of the things I've rated, but I just don't really care. Anyway, repeated listens hardly often change my ratings. I also try not to rate by what my guts tell me. I usually rationalize stuff, especially on first listens, so that my ratings will be more useful to other people.

#6 The fact that so many books still name the Beatles as "the greatest or most significant or most influential" rock band ever only tells you... just kidding. Kill Scaruffi with fire.

#7 My profile picture is not Towelie because I'm a South Park fan (I haven't watched an episode in... 2 years? Can't remember accurately) but because it's a meaningless and absurd character in a meaningless and absurd show, and that reflects: 1- How stupid I think it's the concept of posting a picture in a page like this (Not a social network, nobody wants to know who you are. Do you know Internet provides anonymity? Use it well). 2- How strongly nonsense is buried inside my soul. I'm a sucker for the detail that means nothing. That's another reason why I post fruit pictures in my year end lists and why I often use the Tom_Bombadil nickname in other forums (another nonsensical and cheerful character added as a deus ex machina in a cult novel who saves Frodo and company's ass). Ok, this is not true anymore because now I have the Bower and Chorley pic which is much cooler, but I still think this point somewhat stands, and I am surprised more people aren't pointing in out. So yeah, there's a stroke over that piece of text, but you can still read.

#8 I forgot what #8 was for.

#9 I've changed my rating scale so that it goes up to ten in 0.5 steps. Although it's less convenient for me and the ordering of my own thoughts than my old 100-step rating system, I've acknowledged that people give a total shit whether something is a 7.6 or a 7.7. The point of rating is sharing opinions with other people, and you should do so in a way that it's as useful as possible for those other people. So in a way rating systems with few steps are better because they are easier to digest. But please, don't use letters. They suck. No. Seriously. They suck. WHY THE FUCK WOULD YOU USE LETTERS TO QUANTIFY SOMETHING WHEN NUMBERS WERE INVENTED FOR THAT PURPOSE, YOU ASSHOLE.

#10 The order is gonna go like this: Apple (2013), Pear (2014), Banana (2015), Pineapple (2016), Strawberry (2017), Lemon (2018), Orange (2019). For the next decade, if I'm still here, I'll change from fruits to something else.


+-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+


What the ratings mean:

In simple terms everything 7.5+ is recommended. Everything 8.5+ is strongly recommended. And, well, all 10 records are basically perfect (how good I find one of those to be depends on the day of the week). Everything under 6.0 isn't really worth your time (although that doesn't mean it's bad).

Albums rating system:

1- Give every song a rating between 1 and 20.
2- Average the ratings.
3- Acording to my personal averages chart I calculate the standard deviation.
4- Give the fucking album the fucking rating I want.


+-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------+


Lately I have been writing some compositions and recording them (quite lo-fi, obviously) under the pen name of "Roberto Stewganovsky". I comprised some of my best works into these bandcamp EPs:
https://robertostewganovsky.bandcamp.com/album/ep-1
https://robertostewganovsky.bandcamp.com/album/ep-2
Other tracks:
https://soundcloud.com/fabro10-1/wachiturro-o-supondre
https://soundcloud.com/fabro10-1/arandelas-de-plata-1
https://soundcloud.com/fabro10-1/2016-in-a-nutshell
https://soundcloud.com/fabro10-1/zetaigriegaequis
https://soundcloud.com/fabro10-1/aconcagua
Tell me what you think.