Attempts to set some kind of standard to music are bound to be wrapped in folly. Yet we still need some sort of measuring stick by which our fellow man can gauge what our feeling and intent is. That's the purpose of my stupid little thermometers. The hotter the music, the hotter they get. A 10 is a sure fire winner (and in fact if you don't like it do us both a favour and go find yourself another genre)anything in the 9's is above average, in the 8's are good average, the 7's low average and 6 or below starts indicating failure. Therefore discs we might tend to consider worth buying will range from 7 up. Below that you're on your own, but use your own judgement. What I dislike you may love.

10+

As good as it gets. Not only 100%, but the extra five yards as well. One destined to be an all time classic or favorite, with either no bad tracks or perhaps one or two but the rest is SO incredible you didn't notice. The sort of thing that can rule your world for many months. In a word - Cugat

10

Certainly great in it's own right, and an all time classic, but for some reason it fell slightly short of rocking my world entirely. Like winning a new house with a two instead of three car garage. A petty failing, which is most likely mine. In any case this is so good you'll certainly obsess over it for some time. In a word - Brilliant

9

Anything in a 9 is pretty much scored an A. (perhaps the lower 9's are B+) It marks an excellent and cohesive album that I feel basically acomplished what it meant to. Most if not every song is good to great with a few giants as well. It will likely be an album I listen to often and keep in my listening stack for a while. In a word - Fab

8

This is where the divergence starts to uccur. Mid to upper 8's are good, Rating a B to B+. It is a record that if not world breaking is solid enough. If you like the artist or genre you'll want it, if not you may need to give a moments pause. Lower 8's while still fair are beginning to show areas where perhaps a flaw or two crept into the performance and rate closer to a C. Still, these often contain one or two killer tracks. In a word - Keen

7

This is the lowest area of generally acceptable albums. For whatever reason the album had flaws or struck me badly enough to be here, but it still had at least some kind of redeeming quality to make it worth considering buying. Lets consider this the good try gone bad, however they too usually have at least one brilliant cut and that is the weight which must be measured before a purchase is considered. In a word - Bittersweet

6

It is here that we go from the edge of the cliff to over it. This is the saddest area actually. Albums that wind up in here I generally feel had squandered potential, which is most tragic of all. They could have been, should have been great, but were not. You may still wish to get them but I generally feel they are not worth the money, unless had very cheaply. In a word - Remorse

5

At this point it wasn't that something went wrong, more like nothing went right. The point is that there isn't one redeeming song on it. If anything from it came on the radio between 2 good songs you'd deal with it, just barely. In a word - Yuk

4

How does one quantify bad? In this case, it is festering, and were it to come on the radio you'd seriously think about changing the station. At the very least you'd bitch about it. Not the worst there is, but we're getting close. In a word - Suck

3

This is probably the grey area score of badness. Why was it so bad it got this low but no lower? Pity? Regret? Quite possibly. This may be to the depths of suckiness what a 6 score is to better albums. "If only it didn't suck so much, it might just be not good." In a word - Wretch

2

Again, I'm not sure what level of badness would cause me to rate a record this low, but no further. There isn't as much lee-way in badness, generally if something sucks it tends to go the full monty. So I suppose badness is the one thing that seldom disappoints, but this is getting closer to doing it perfectly. In a word - Crap

1

A score of one is like a degree of temperature above absolute zero. Does anyone notice? Probably not. I suppose there might be one slight gleam of non suckiness or perhaps it would be just pity that would prevent me from giving it the total heave ho. In any event, this really isn't good. In a word - Shite

0

A rating so remarkable and an album so bad one can only throw their hands up and ask "Why!?". People with no musical training and no sense of rhythm would actually do better and score higher. Getting a zero actually takes effort. This is the icing on the cake of human failure. In a word - Rank