Harem Scarem vs Gotthard

[KarpetRydOFunk]

For the record, 'Lipservice' is currently ranked 5th, but if 'Need to Believe' is as good as the first 3 songs, that'll smoke it too, and 'Lipservice' will rank 6th! However, if memory serves, 'Need to believe' goes downhill pretty quick. And that's the thing with Gotthard - they were their own worst enemy. In 'Lipservice' and 'Domino Effect,' they released two 15 song albums in a row. Both albums have AT LEAST five pure fillers on them and would have benefited to no end by having just been 10 track discs without the clunkers. And I know people hate when blatant fillers are called fillers, so to put it in other terms - both discs have about 10 good to great melodic / commercial rock songs, and then there's 5 unmelodic hookless wastes of space on there. And how about tracks 6, 7 and 8 on 'Homerun' single-handedly bringing the score for that album down by a mile. Very silly band at times.

 

I was relistening to 'Domino Effect' just thinking, shit this is good. No wonder this is my favourite Gotthard album. The first 9 songs are all great. And then it hits. The meekest end to a CD possible. The 13th track is another winner, but the other 5 songs at the end of that CD are all so pointless, and bring down the entire score of the album so much further than it needs to go.

 

And same with 'Lipservice.' Although it features 2 of Gotthard's best songs ever in 'I wonder' and 'Anytime anywhere,' but jeez the album takes forever to get started, with the first 5 songs being very poor to okay, and the last 3, before the good bonus track, being weak too. I don't know how people overlook all the fillers on this disc to rate it so high. Compared to 'Overload,' with only one single weaker song, I don't see how the two albums are even comparable.

Okay, now I know you're out of your damn mind. Well, actually, I think we were all aware.

[Geoff]

Im actually giving bands who provide value for money the benefit of the doubt this year, by rating the best 12 songs.........seems only fair. Afterall there is a skip button and one man's trash is another man's gold so how is the band to know what constitutes a filler....

 

12 seems about right for the length of an album.

 

So if Gotthard or any other band want to record more than 12 songs I wont penalise that album in my ratings if there are a few fillers.....or a real clunker (imho) which really drags the rating down.

 

I have thought soooo many times about doing something like that. My other idea was to just not include the weakest 2 rated songs off any album into the overall average score. It saddens me when I'm rating an album full of, for example, 9/10 songs and then there's one 5/10 clunker which brings down the whole disc. I sometimes think it's unfair, but then I think really, it's the band's fault for recording such garbage and allowing it to make it to an album. And I think an album should be judged from start to end for everything that is released on that disc. But I don't know, it does play on my mind a bit. End of the day, though, bands that release 10/10 great songs should rightly be acknowledged over bands that release 8/10 great tunes.

 

Karpetface, I have a challenge for you. I know you don't rate discs, but pull out 'Lip service' off the shelf, play it through and roughly think what kind of score you would give each song and let me know what you think you'd score it, roughly. Simply put, it's just not quite as good as the hype suggests, when you actually sit down with it and assess it. Full of fillers.

 

Anyway, I'm always one to admit my mistakes, and I made an error in my choices above. Here are the few verified choices I've made so far:

 

Harem Scarem - s/t ; 97%

Gotthard - s/t ; 79%

 

Harem Scarem - Mood Swings ; 89%

Gotthard - 'Dial Hard' ; 67%

 

Gotthard - 'G' ; 64%

Harem Scarem - 'Voice Of Reason' ; 62%

 

Yeah, after rating the discs, I admit I messed up and I do actually prefer 'G' over 'Voice Of Reason,' amazingly. The main reason 'Voice Of Reason' scored that low, plain and simply, was because I gave 'And that's all' a 0. It is very infrequent I face a song that I refuse to give any score at all - even a 1 - but this song is as deserving as any. Disgraceful without a single redeeming feature.

 

As for what constitutes a filler, I know everyone skates around the issue, but I don't think it's that complicated. If a band records an album full of songs with great riffs, good hooks and strong choruses, but includes one or two songs that do not have a good riff, hook and chorus, those songs are fillers. Simple as that.

[phaffas]

Cant i just vote for every album listed? :wub:

[Glen]

Geoff -

 

Filler - yeah but that song which hasnt got a hook 'in your opinion' someone else might LOVE just because of the melody or the lyrics or the riff or the guitar solo......as I said how does the band 'know' what is a filler - a song someone might hate, someone else might love. They can only really go on their own instincts.

 

Rating - I mean fillers or clunckers in excess of 12 songs. If a band release a 10-12 track album and it has fillers/clunkers (imo) then it gets rated as so. If a band release a 14 track album (ie value for money) and there are 3 fillers say....then the 'best' filler gets included in the rating. Capiche??

[Geoff]

Geoff -

 

Filler - yeah but that song which hasnt got a hook 'in your opinion' someone else might LOVE just because of the melody or the lyrics or the riff or the guitar solo......as I said how does the band 'know' what is a filler - a song someone might hate, someone else might love. They can only really go on their own instincts.

 

Rating - I mean fillers or clunckers in excess of 12 songs. If a band release a 10-12 track album and it has fillers/clunkers (imo) then it gets rated as so. If a band release a 14 track album (ie value for money) and there are 3 fillers say....then the 'best' filler gets included in the rating. Capiche??

 

Haha, okay picking up what you're putting down. I was listening to a bunch of Harem Scarem albums today and I was thinking how smart they played it. And it made me wonder in general, would I prefer a band hit me with 10 killer songs, leaving me wanting more. Or would I prefer they dragged it out for 15 songs and risk hindering the excellence of the album by including weaker tunes which take the glow off the album.

 

It's a hard question, because I've listened to a lot of discs where the band is on fire and I keep just praying for one more extra song. But off the top of my head, the only band that has ever pulled off a 15 song album is Bonfire with 'Point Blank.' You could rightly argue that 'Gimme Some' probably falls into the filler category, but holy shit, they got 14/15 right so it's hard to fault them. I can't think of any other band that has put 13+ great songs on one single album.

 

So that said, I personally love the 10 tracks of bliss and leave 'em wanting more concept.

[Glen]

Im inclined to agree but what about albums like 'Freedom Rock' which was 14 songs long and got dragged down by 2-3 fillers (or what I would say is a filler).

 

Surely it would be fairer just to rate the best 12??

 

[PS agree on Point Blank - that is the longest consistently excellent album in existence....oh and Gimme Some is killer by the way....esp the start ]

[Dead Planet]

HS=2 and Gott=6.......1st 2 went to HS and the rest Gotthard, there were some close ones there..Human Nature would have won against just about anything other than Domino Effect....

[Glen]

Err arent HS winning 4 or am I going blind?

[KarpetRydOFunk]

Err arent HS winning 4 or am I going blind?

He was referring to himself. And, yeah, you probably are going blind. I mean, you are pretty old.

[Glen]

Derr. As you were

[DaHun72]

harem scarem debut is killer, then it's all gotthard for me. They're just too consistent for me and hs always failed to live up to the debut and hype imo.

[Geoff]

Harem Scarem - s/t ; 97%

Gotthard - s/t ; 79%

 

Harem Scarem - Mood Swings ; 89%

Gotthard - 'Dial Hard' ; 67%

 

Gotthard - 'G' ; 64%

Harem Scarem - 'Voice Of Reason' ; 62%

 

 

To finish this up:

 

Harem Scarem - Weight Of The World ; 81%

Gotthard - Homerun ; 75%

 

Harem Scarem - Higher ; 83%

Gotthard - Human Zoo ; 75%

 

Harem Scarem - Overload ; 78%

Gotthard - Lipservice ; 73%

 

Harem Scarem - Human Nature ; 80%

Gotthard - Domino Effect ; 77%

 

Harem Scarem - Hope ; 79%

Gotthard - Need To Believe ; 78%

 

So yeah, a few close ones in there, but it's Harem Scarem across the board, apart from 'G' over 'Voice of Reason' for me.

[The Rocker]

 

Harem Scarem - s/t ; 97%

Gotthard - s/t ; 79%

 

Harem Scarem - Mood Swings ; 89%

Gotthard - 'Dial Hard' ; 67%

 

Gotthard - 'G' ; 64%

Harem Scarem - 'Voice Of Reason' ; 62%

 

 

To finish this up:

 

Harem Scarem - Weight Of The World ; 81%

Gotthard - Homerun ; 75%

 

Harem Scarem - Higher ; 83%

Gotthard - Human Zoo ; 75%

 

Harem Scarem - Overload ; 78%

Gotthard - Lipservice ; 73%

 

Harem Scarem - Human Nature ; 80%

Gotthard - Domino Effect ; 77%

 

Harem Scarem - Hope ; 79%

Gotthard - Need To Believe ; 78%

 

So yeah, a few close ones in there, but it's Harem Scarem across the board, apart from 'G' over 'Voice of Reason' for me.

 

Overload over Lipservice?!!! Wow

[AlphaMale]

73% for Lipservice????

 

I thought Lipservice was a nearly perfect masterpiece. One of my favorite discs of all time.

[Geoff]

73% for Lipservice????

 

I thought Lipservice was a nearly perfect masterpiece. One of my favorite discs of all time.

 

Have you done a song-by-song rating of it? Give it a go - I am almost convinced you'll surprise yourself. I always thought it was way over-rated, but even I admit I thought I'd rate it higher than 73%. But there's just a lot of fillers on the CD. Simple as that.

[Glen]

Lipservice is definitely an album where you should only be rating the best 12 songs imo - like what we were discussing before.

 

Im a bit surprised by your HS ratings - I would imagine (and I'm intrigued now...) that all my ratings would be higher (pardon the pun) except the debut which would be lower....97% is a crazy high score. Its a great album, but that's almost 10s across the board??

[eaglesfan3000]

I voted Gotthard across the board, like Geoff said they are completely different bands.

[Geoff]

Lipservice is definitely an album where you should only be rating the best 12 songs imo - like what we were discussing before.

 

Im a bit surprised by your HS ratings - I would imagine (and I'm intrigued now...) that all my ratings would be higher (pardon the pun) except the debut which would be lower....97% is a crazy high score. Its a great album, but that's almost 10s across the board??

 

Yep, first 4 tracks are obviously all 10's and then after that, most of them aren't that far off either. Brilliant album.

 

Trust me, I thought most HS albums would be much higher rated too, but I'm constantly surprised when I break it down in this format.

 

Chopping the weakest 3 songs off 'Lipservice' would definitely impact the rating, but that's kind of "letting them off." It's not like they're just 3 awful songs at the end, but spread evenly across the disc at track 1, 7 & 14.

[Glen]

But they still provided u with 12 goodies. Makes sense to me

[AlphaMale]

I graded out Lipservice today for Geoffrey....

 

My take:

 

1. All We Are 8.0/10

2. Dream On 8.0/10

3. Lift U Up 8.0/10

4. Everything I Want 9.0/10

5. Cupid's Arrow 10/10

6. I Wonder 10/10

7. I'm Alive 7/10

8. I've Seen an Angel Cry 7.5/10

9. Stay for the Night 9/10

10. Anytime Anywhere 10/10

11. Said and Done 10/10

12. The Other Side of Me 9/10

13. Nothing Left at All 8/10

14. And then Goodbye 8/10

15. Can't Stop bonus track 9.5/10

 

 

TOTAL: 87%

[Geoff]

But they still provided u with 12 goodies. Makes sense to me

 

Ah, but you read between the lines there incorrectly, san. I said the three weakest songs. Not the only weak songs on the CD. There are a lot more weak songs on this CD. Those three are just the worst of the lot.

 

And fair enough, Russ. To each their own - glad you like it all that much. My scores obviously are very different to that, but that's cool. Some of the songs you give 8's I was dishing out 5's, so we obviously have variations in our tastes in music.