# Unfair Reviews



## Adam Weber (Apr 9, 2015)

Title says it all: name some unfair reviews. Too positive, too negative, or anything in between.


----------



## Pugg (Aug 8, 2014)

Do not go there: One man's meat is another man's poison :tiphat:


----------



## Adam Weber (Apr 9, 2015)

Yes, I see what you mean... But the thread is here, so... Let's see how it plays out. :devil:


----------



## Xenakiboy (May 8, 2016)

Any YouTube comment section of a piece from the 20th/21St century, even late 19th century is expected to have a ton a nasty and vicious comments, a little more than unfair!


----------



## SixFootScowl (Oct 17, 2011)

Always irks me when someone blunderingly posts a one-star review on Amazon because their CD came damaged or missing pieces, when the reviews are meant to be for the recording, not the shipping problems.

But even with reviews of the recordings, there are plenty on Amazon that are unfair. That's why I take what the reviewers say, consider the number of reviews, look up some independent reviews, and then listen to the clips. If you like the clips, then the reviews are just interesting reading.


----------



## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

"I'll give this CD one star, and that only because Amazon won't allow fewer. The cover picture of Ms. Mutter is most unflattering. The music is fine, but still..."

"Not sure why they even bothered to sell this. My turntable simply won't track it, and the grooves are quite invisible. I'd ask for my money back but it's severely scratched now (inferior materials obviously). And yes, I tried it on 33 RPM as well."


----------



## Pugg (Aug 8, 2014)

Adam Weber said:


> Yes, I see what you mean... But the thread is here, so... Let's see how it plays out. :devil:


Did you actually browse trough all the topics? 
Then you have your answer .


----------



## Nereffid (Feb 6, 2013)

I guess all reviews seem unfair to _someone_.

I dislike what you like, because I have carefully considered it and objectively found it to be wanting.
You dislike what I like, because you don't understand it or haven't taken enough time to get to like it.
He dislikes what we like, because he's an idiot.


----------



## SeptimalTritone (Jul 7, 2014)

I have zero problems with dislike of Schoenberg or Babbitt or Boulez.

Like I have said _many_ times, I'm taste neutral. I place zero positive or negative value on like or dislike of anything. I don't even esteem anyone higher if they do like Schoenberg, or esteem anyone lower if they dislike Schoenberg. While I would always welcome more people who share my interests, I would never call someone "too superficial to understand Schoenberg" if they didn't like it.

I only have problems with statements of factual error, that is, ones that directly contradict what's on a published score. If someone says "I don't like Schoenberg", that's fine. If someone says "Schoenberg has no melodies", I will argue against the false claim. "Schoenberg has no melodies" is a false statement of musical content, and I will argue against it in the same way that I would argue against 1 + 1 = 3. But I never, ever, would call someone "too superficial to understand Schoenberg" or "an idiot", either directly or through implication.


----------



## Nereffid (Feb 6, 2013)

Why are you trying to make this about modern music?


----------



## Arsakes (Feb 20, 2012)

Nicolas Cage movies... extra-ordinarily good, always bashed by critics!


----------



## Triplets (Sep 4, 2014)

Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto. Hanslick caled it "music that stinks to the ear".


----------



## SeptimalTritone (Jul 7, 2014)

Nereffid said:


> Why are you trying to make this about modern music?


I equally dislike false statements about Mozart and Mahler (i.e. his 8th symphony is formless or less well formed, which is factually wrong).

The same goes for common practice music as goes for modern music.

But you've stated in the past that there are fans of Schoenberg who, when a non-fan says they don't like Schoenberg, the fan says "Oh, you must not be discerning enough", which is also a false read of the fans of Schoenberg. You've even compared us to "the boyfriend who coerces his girlfriend to do certain physical things she doesn't want to do." The fans of Schoenberg are interested in correcting factual errors, not to "peg" people for not having the "right" taste. That is your idea, your invention.


----------



## elgar's ghost (Aug 8, 2010)

On Amazon Bernard O'Hanlan is often given negs but I find his reviews witty and refreshing whether I agree with him or not. His hatchet job on Roger Norrington still makes me chuckle even though I quite like his Beethoven cycle.


----------



## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

"It is so execrably and ponderously dull." (George Bernard Shaw on Brahms Requiem)


----------



## Blancrocher (Jul 6, 2013)

KenOC said:


> "I'll give this CD one star, and that only because Amazon won't allow fewer. The cover picture of Ms. Mutter is most unflattering. The music is fine, but still..."
> 
> "Not sure why they even bothered to sell this. My turntable simply won't track it, and the grooves are quite invisible. I'd ask for my money back but it's severely scratched now (inferior materials obviously). And yes, I tried it on 33 RPM as well."


Thanks, KenOC--I'm tempted to squander yet another day reading one-star reviews of masterpieces on Amazon.


----------



## Mahlerian (Nov 27, 2012)

Well, time to pull this one out again:

"Brass, lots of brass, incredibly much brass! Even more brass, nothing but brass!--that was the first movement....None the less, the fourth movement is positively the last [a reference to the changed order of the inner movements], and with it Mahler's symphony ends, for all symphonies must end sometime, even if they are as endlessly long as Mahler's Sixth, entitled 'tragic'. And now, heedless of the shrieks of rage of the Mahlerites, a loud, clear, and energetic protest must be made against the corruption of healthy musical sense and taste by performances of this kind in the city where Beethoven, Schubert, Mozart, and Haydn lived and produced their most sublime works....Theater people used to maintain that Mahler was a fine symphonist. Knowledgeable music lovers can now prove that he is not a good symphonist....His melodic invention is minimal, his contrapuntal and thematic elaboration is nil, and many things which look imposing on his scores produce no effect because you don't hear them. The harps with their gissandos and the thrice-divided violas labour in vain to be heard during the assault of the gigantic army of brass, and the insistent and continuous ringing of cow and sheep bells cannot conceal the hopeless emptiness of the Sixth Symphony." - Heinrich Reinhardt


----------



## Nereffid (Feb 6, 2013)

SeptimalTritone said:


> I equally dislike false statements about Mozart and Mahler (i.e. his 8th symphony is formless or less well formed, which is factually wrong).
> 
> The same goes for common practice music as goes for modern music.
> 
> But you've stated in the past that there are fans of Schoenberg who, when a non-fan says they don't like Schoenberg, the fan says "Oh, you must not be discerning enough", which is also a false read of the fans of Schoenberg. You've even compared us to "the boyfriend who coerces his girlfriend to do certain physical things she doesn't want to do." The fans of Schoenberg are interested in correcting factual errors, not to "peg" people for not having the "right" taste. That is your idea, your invention.


Maybe I should have asked, why are you trying to make it about _me_? 

If you think I don't think the same thing about most other people in the world as I do about these "fans of Schoenberg" of which you speak, then you've not been paying close enough attention. But then again, seeing as you've been keeping close enough tabs on me that you're willing to put in the effort to over-interpret a general comment I've made, perhaps you're paying _too much_ attention.

ETA: Apologies to Adam Weber for the irrelevance. The thread deserves better than this.

With which in mind, the most unfair review I ever read was one by Lynn René Bayley in _Fanfare._ Well, actually, _several_ reviews by Lynn René Bayley, but the one in particular that stands out is a review of an album by the baroque ensemble Les Amis de Philippe on a CPO release:
"It's rather disappointing to consider that conductor Ludwig Rémy, who appears to be a middle-aged man, could have made it this far in life without the least shred of feeling for music."


----------



## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

"What a good thing this isn't music"

Rossini on Berlioz Symphony Fantastique


----------



## Huilunsoittaja (Apr 6, 2010)

Unfair, and certainly _ironic_...

"It's drunkard's music." - Glazunov on Sibelius' excessive ostinato figures

:lol:


----------



## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

I note even Beethoven is getting some poor reviews from some of the musical giants on TC ! :lol:


----------



## SixFootScowl (Oct 17, 2011)

From a one-star review of Pinnock's Messiah :lol::



> The list of bad things is long, though. The choir sounds unspired, the alto lacks both depth and clarity and the orchestra's timing is off. But all those things are just nitpicking. Then there's John Tomlinson. Honestly, he sounds like a drunk who's swallowed a fog horn. The yoke is easy, but this a joke.


Yet it rates 4.6 stars out of 66 reviews.


----------



## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Florestan said:


> From a one-star review of Pinnock's Messiah :lol::
> 
> Yet it rates 4.6 stars out of 66 reviews.


The guy needs a new pair of ears. Pinnock's is the best Messiah around.


----------



## Animal the Drummer (Nov 14, 2015)

Florestan said:


> From a one-star review of Pinnock's Messiah :lol::
> 
> Yet it rates 4.6 stars out of 66 reviews.


I don't know Pinnock's "Messiah" so can't comment on this recording direct. However, in my time I've found myself dissenting from the hype surrounding other widely praised recordings of Baroque music too, specifically Gardiner's versions of the major Bach choral works, which I find technically polished but musically soulless, so I wouldn't automatically assume the majority must be right.


----------



## SixFootScowl (Oct 17, 2011)

DavidA said:


> The guy needs a new pair of ears. Pinnock's is the best Messiah around.


Pinnock's Messiah is excellent! Tomlinson has a beautiful deep bass voice that I think on account of the deepness of it is a little harder to understand but to say a drunk who swallowed a foghorn is absurd.


----------



## Bulldog (Nov 21, 2013)

Animal the Drummer said:


> I don't know Pinnock's "Messiah" so can't comment on this recording direct. However, in my time I've found myself dissenting from the hype surrounding other widely praised recordings of Baroque music too, specifically Gardiner's versions of the major Bach choral works, which I find technically polished but musically soulless, so I wouldn't automatically assume the majority must be right.


Gardiner's Bach has plenty of soul, but it's of the celebratory kind, not devotional.


----------



## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Florestan said:


> Pinnock's Messiah is excellent! Tomlinson has a beautiful deep bass voice that I think on account of the deepness of it is a little harder to understand but to say a drunk who swallowed a foghorn is absurd.


Handel specified a bass not a baritone. Tomlinson is a true bass. Marvellous!


----------



## Woodduck (Mar 17, 2014)

DavidA said:


> Handel specified a bass not a baritone. Tomlinson is a true bass. Marvellous!


"Baritone" didn't exist as a separate category in Handel's day. Even in the 19th century, Wagner calls for "basses" (sometimes "high bass" or "low bass" in his low-voiced male roles). I don't know just when the term "baritone" became the norm fora voice between bass and tenor.


----------



## sloth (Jul 12, 2013)

Mahlerian said:


> Well, time to pull this one out again:
> 
> "Brass, lots of brass, incredibly much brass! Even more brass, nothing but brass!--that was the first movement....None the less, the fourth movement is positively the last [a reference to the changed order of the inner movements], and with it Mahler's symphony ends, for all symphonies must end sometime, even if they are as endlessly long as Mahler's Sixth, entitled 'tragic'. And now, heedless of the shrieks of rage of the Mahlerites, a loud, clear, and energetic protest must be made against the corruption of healthy musical sense and taste by performances of this kind in the city where Beethoven, Schubert, Mozart, and Haydn lived and produced their most sublime works....Theater people used to maintain that Mahler was a fine symphonist. Knowledgeable music lovers can now prove that he is not a good symphonist....His melodic invention is minimal, his contrapuntal and thematic elaboration is nil, and many things which look imposing on his scores produce no effect because you don't hear them. The harps with their gissandos and the thrice-divided violas labour in vain to be heard during the assault of the gigantic army of brass, and the insistent and continuous ringing of cow and sheep bells cannot conceal the hopeless emptiness of the Sixth Symphony." - Heinrich Reinhardt


you have to take a look at the man... seems like this little man has a high consideration of himself :lol:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heinr...ig_Grillich_-_Heinrich_Reinhardt,_um_1900.jpg


----------



## manyene (Feb 7, 2015)

The initial reception of Rachmaninov's First Symphony which nearly lost us a good symphony.


----------



## GreenMamba (Oct 14, 2012)

manyene said:


> The initial reception of Rachmaninov's First Symphony which nearly lost us a good symphony.


I believe the performance of the debut really was that bad, however, which makes me wonder how much slack we should give reviewers who haven't had a chance to hear a work's best interpretation.


----------



## Pugg (Aug 8, 2014)

DavidA said:


> I note even Beethoven is getting some poor reviews from some of the musical giants on TC ! :lol:


Good one DavidA:tiphat:


----------



## DeepR (Apr 13, 2012)

Arsakes said:


> Nicolas Cage movies... extra-ordinarily good, always bashed by critics!


You mean like Ghost Rider?


----------



## manyene (Feb 7, 2015)

Some of the early reviews of Steve Reich come to mind, about the LP being 'stuck in the groove'


----------



## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

"All you need to write like him is a large bottle of ink."
(Stravinsky on Messiaen)


----------



## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

"The musical equivalent of St Pancras Station." (Sir Thomas Beecham on Elgar)


----------



## Animal the Drummer (Nov 14, 2015)

Bulldog said:


> Gardiner's Bach has plenty of soul, but it's of the celebratory kind, not devotional.


How interesting. The devotional passages can feel a little hustled along sometimes, but I can tune in to some of them eventually. It's actually Gardiner's renderings of the celebratory passages in this glorious music that I have most trouble with, because for me there's a clipped, poker-faced quality about them that robs them of any celebratory element. Vive la difference, I guess.


----------



## DavidA (Dec 14, 2012)

Animal the Drummer said:


> How interesting. The devotional passages can feel a little hustled along sometimes, but I can tune in to some of them eventually. It's actually Gardiner's renderings of the celebratory passages in this glorious music that I have most trouble with, because for me *there's a clipped, poker-faced quality about them *that robs them of any celebratory element. Vive la difference, I guess.


Yes, agreed. It is one way of doing Bach but it is somewhat soulless to me.


----------



## Steatopygous (Jul 5, 2015)

You need the Lexicon of Musical Invective, a work of genius.
I'm not sure if this is in the book, but my favourite riposte to criticism comes from Max Reger, offended by the critic of the Berlin Signale. Reger wrote:
"Dear sir. I am seated in the smallest room of my house. Your review is in front of me. Very soon it will be behind me. Yours, Reger."
If this post doesn't get a dozen likes, it can only be because not as many as a dozen people read it! Reger's remark was brilliant.


----------



## GreenMamba (Oct 14, 2012)

Steatopygous said:


> You need the Lexicon of Musical Invective, a work of genius.
> I'm not sure if this is in the book, but my favourite riposte to criticism comes from Max Reger, offended by the critic of the Berlin Signale. Reger wrote:
> "Dear sir. I am seated in the smallest room of my house. Your review is in front of me. Very soon it will be behind me. Yours, Reger."
> *If this post doesn't get a dozen likes, it can only be because not as many as a dozen people read it!* Reger's remark was brilliant.


Or it's because we've heard the anecdote so many times before


----------



## Mahlerian (Nov 27, 2012)

Steatopygous said:


> You need the Lexicon of Musical Invective, a work of genius.
> I'm not sure if this is in the book, but my favourite riposte to criticism comes from Max Reger, offended by the critic of the Berlin Signale. Reger wrote:
> "Dear sir. I am seated in the smallest room of my house. Your review is in front of me. Very soon it will be behind me. Yours, Reger."
> If this post doesn't get a dozen likes, it can only be because not as many as a dozen people read it! Reger's remark was brilliant.


It is mentioned in there, alongside the review that prompted the riposte.


----------



## Guest (Jun 8, 2016)

Nereffid said:


> I guess all reviews seem unfair to _someone_.
> 
> I dislike what you like, because I have carefully considered it and objectively found it to be wanting.
> You dislike what I like, because you don't understand it or haven't taken enough time to get to like it.
> He dislikes what we like, because he's an idiot.


You forgot, and we dislike what he likes because he's an idiot.


----------



## Guest (Jun 8, 2016)

Mahlerian said:


> Well, time to pull this one out again:
> 
> "Brass, lots of brass, incredibly much brass! Even more brass, nothing but brass!--that was the first movement....None the less, the fourth movement is positively the last [a reference to the changed order of the inner movements], and with it Mahler's symphony ends, for all symphonies must end sometime, even if they are as endlessly long as Mahler's Sixth, entitled 'tragic'. And now, heedless of the shrieks of rage of the Mahlerites, a loud, clear, and energetic protest must be made against the corruption of healthy musical sense and taste by performances of this kind in the city where Beethoven, Schubert, Mozart, and Haydn lived and produced their most sublime works....Theater people used to maintain that Mahler was a fine symphonist. Knowledgeable music lovers can now prove that he is not a good symphonist....His melodic invention is minimal, his contrapuntal and thematic elaboration is nil, and many things which look imposing on his scores produce no effect because you don't hear them. The harps with their gissandos and the thrice-divided violas labour in vain to be heard during the assault of the gigantic army of brass, and the insistent and continuous ringing of cow and sheep bells cannot conceal the hopeless emptiness of the Sixth Symphony." - Heinrich Reinhardt


I am literally laughing out loud at that! I though I was the only one who couldn't listen to the damn thing.


----------



## Steatopygous (Jul 5, 2015)

GreenMamba said:


> Or it's because we've heard the anecdote so many times before


Yes, fair point. I should have thought of that! Still, I bet you smiled again at the familiar memory.


----------



## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

"Beethoven always sounds like the upsetting of bags - with here and there a dropped hammer." -- John Ruskin


----------



## Nereffid (Feb 6, 2013)

Jerome said:


> You forgot, and we dislike what he likes because he's an idiot.


:tiphat:

Spot on - mind if I steal it?


----------



## Heliogabo (Dec 29, 2014)

About Biondi´s Vivaldi:

Biondi's playing is mediocre at best. His tempos are off, his allegros are too fast, because of his technical shortcomings, no doubt. His phrasing is awful, it shows that he has no understanding of the material whatsoever. The recording quality is also poor. :lol:


----------



## SixFootScowl (Oct 17, 2011)

I just came up with one that might be good to apply to reviews of some recordings:

*"This recording is so bad I had to take Q-tip swabs and wipe the residue out of my ears."*


----------



## Marinera (May 13, 2016)

Heliogabo said:


> About Biondi´s Vivaldi:
> 
> Biondi's playing is mediocre at best. His tempos are off, his allegros are too fast, because of his technical shortcomings, no doubt. His phrasing is awful, it shows that he has no understanding of the material whatsoever. The recording quality is also poor. :lol:


Where have you unearthed it? It should be seen at the source to be believed, some people are less bilious after violent food poisoning.



> his allegros are too fast, because of his technical shortcomings, no doubt.


Now, I'm not a musician, but isn't this a contradiction in statements.


----------



## Marinera (May 13, 2016)

KenOC said:


> "Beethoven always sounds like the upsetting of bags - with here and there a dropped hammer." -- John Ruskin


Kind of echoes my own sentiments, except his are more descriptive.


----------



## Animal the Drummer (Nov 14, 2015)

Marinera said:


> Now, I'm not a musician, but isn't this a contradiction in statements.


Not necessarily. Increased speed can be the result of loss of control, so that the music "runs away with" the player. And it can happen to the very best - Murray Perahia's first Baroque recital, featuring Handel and Scarlatti, includes examples of this, though in fairness it should be added that he was just coming back after a serious injury.


----------



## Marinera (May 13, 2016)

Animal the Drummer said:


> Not necessarily. Increased speed can be the result of loss of control, so that the music "runs away with" the player. And it can happen to the very best - Murray Perahia's first Baroque recital, featuring Handel and Scarlatti, includes examples of this, though in fairness it should be added that he was just coming back after a serious injury.


Well you live and learn. Thank you:tiphat:


----------



## SixFootScowl (Oct 17, 2011)

Here is an absurd review someone posted on Beethoven symphonies (can this guy be for real or maybe he is a dope head?):



> *Beethoven is one of the greatest composers ever...he also stole his name from that St. Bernard.*
> 
> Beethoven not only ripped off that movie's name, but his music is plain awful. All the songs are radio unfriendly with no rapping in the songs, no distorted guitar, no St. Anger drums, and no hard bass. Just some music you'd find in an old folk's home. And if this guy is so good, how come he's not on MTV and why isn't there any Beethoven shirts in Hot Topic? Hopefully he can make a deal with them when he records his next album.
> 
> They also say that composers such as Mozart can make your baby smarter, but if you want your baby to be a genius, play ICP, Limp Bizkit, Korn, or Nickelback instead.


----------



## SixFootScowl (Oct 17, 2011)

Here is one I just saw on Amazon for a nice album of Christmas carols sung in German:



> The whole CD was lack lustre and very disappointing. Giving it to a friend who has an allotment and can use it as a bird deterrent.


Not quite sure what the second sentence means. I am picturing the CD hanging on a string to flip around in the breeze and scare off birds. A shame because it is a very nice album (maybe I will even buy one), and there are plenty of Justin Bieber and such CDs to use for bird deterrents.


----------



## Pugg (Aug 8, 2014)

Florestan said:


> Here is one I just saw on Amazon for a nice album of Christmas carols sung in German:
> 
> Not quite sure what the second sentence means. I am picturing the CD hanging on a string to flip around in the breeze and scare off birds. A shame because it is a very nice album (maybe I will even buy one), and there are plenty of Justin Bieber and such CDs to use for bird deterrents.


They are just bully's with noting else to do in their pity lives than do such horrible things.
Don't pay any attention to those losers, it's a waste of time .


----------



## clavichorder (May 2, 2011)

Triplets said:


> Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto. Hanslick caled it "music that stinks to the ear".


I remember that one. Yikes! It's simple but descriptive, though I never felt anything similar.


----------



## Adam Weber (Apr 9, 2015)

Some reviewers have a habit of bashing HIP recordings. Repeatedly. Why they keep listening, I have no idea. It seems unfair. If you don't like HIP recordings, just stop listening.


----------



## SixFootScowl (Oct 17, 2011)

Adam Weber said:


> Some reviewers have a habit of bashing HIP recordings. Repeatedly. Why they keep listening, I have no idea. It seems unfair. If you don't like HIP recordings, just stop listening.


In some cases they just have not heard the right HIP recording. There are some bad non-HIP recordings too they can dislike.


----------



## Mahlerian (Nov 27, 2012)

Adam Weber said:


> Some reviewers have a habit of bashing HIP recordings. Repeatedly. Why they keep listening, I have no idea. It seems unfair. If you don't like HIP recordings, just stop listening.


Why does the name Bernard Michael O'Hanlon immediately come to mind?


----------



## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

O'Hanlon's reviews may be unfair, but they're entertainihng. For that, I can forgive a lot.


----------



## Adam Weber (Apr 9, 2015)

Mahlerian said:


> Why does the name Bernard Michael O'Hanlon immediately come to mind?


I may or may not have had him in mind...

Believe it or not, though, he does like _some_ HIP recordings.

(When the moon is full and the stars align.)

He liked Staier's recording of Mozart's last piano concerto if I remember correctly.


----------

