While we're on the topic of AI writing reviews, I loaded up ChatGPT and had it write a negative review for Iron Maiden's latest album to see how well it wrote reviews. Here's what it wrote:



Basically, the review was very bare-boned and basic, and the AI bot didn't went into specific details about what made the lyrics forced or the production muddy. If I were a mod in the review queue and I saw this review, I likely would've rejected it.

With that said, I do agree with the motion that AI written reviews should be banned, especially as AI gets better and better with writing.

My favorite part of that was "muddy and muddled".

It's so unfathomably, colossally lame to use Chat GPT to write for you.

Sure it's clearly unacceptable, but it isn't a far cry from the ones of this user either. To reiterate, I'm not assuming he necessarily used an AI – as N_S already said he could just be an extremely lazy and unimaginative individual – but it's at the very least plausible, especially compared to your attempt at it.

However, I seriously think (fear?) it's gonna be very tough to discern average human-written reviews from AI-generated ones in the not-so-distant future, especially if they keep improving at this rate. Let's see...


Of course the rejection message was the same for all of them. Seemed fitting, in a way.

Wow, this is fucking crazy. I noticed the user's profile said they were 18, so I was just thinking "okay, this person is very new to writing," but this is even worse.

Yeah that's some shit, I started writing here at 17 and was better than that lol. If indeed these were AI generated and it doesn't seem unlikely given that example review of Senjutsu, that's hardly an accomplishment, but still.

I'm an ESL teacher and have a group of about 110 freshman university students all doing the same course. The first writing assignment I gave them after ChatGPT came out, I identified about 8-9 assignments that I thought were AI generated. Some of them I could only identify because the grammar was too lofty and accurate or they had made dumb mistakes like writing everything perfectly except for one personal sentence they had obviously written themselves. What I told those students is that if they had bothered to teach the AI to make a few grammar mistakes, I might not have noticed. If they had taught the AI more about the topic and necessary writing style, it would have been okay too.

We are only able to catch the AI reviews generated by lazy people, stupid people, or people unfamiliar with MA's guidelines. I fully predict that we have several AI reviews already on the site, and that they look genuine enough that no one has noticed and probably will never notice. However, these are likely written by people who have spent time with the AI, and have trained it to write properly for this site. They might also be able to copy someone else's style. It's no fun, but it'll be hard to spot. I'd like to see a Chairthrower bot though.

Talk about an absolute game-changer!

What even is a chairthrower bot?

https://www.metal-archives.com/reviews/ ... 12/1651249

Thank to your review that me made want to relistining Human.

Ironic Secret Face and Cosmic Sea are my favorites songs….

The remaster is a miliar stone.

Bot with a lot of work to do to copy this:
https://www.metal-archives.com/reviews/ ... WER/374625

If we can engineer a Chairthrower bot, I will take back every mean thing I’ve said about AI.

It's things like these that reassure me that we're still a long way from being taken over by machines.

A chairthrower bot review would just be word salad.

There can only be one such wordthrower, as, while doesn't appeal to all, it rests easy knowing its style is forever inimitable by either man or machine. (Mouhaha!...)

I cannot believe someone can give 10% to Emperor at Nightside eclipse

What world we living!!!!!

You mean the one written by Human666?

Yeah, it wasn't exactly the best. He tries to argue that it shouldn't be a classic and that it's main problem is "unbearable repetitiveness and overlong song lengths." The song length part doesn't make any sense, as the longest song is at the beginning at eight minutes, and I don't get the feeling of "Man, this song would've been so much better if it was shorter."

Then again, if Human666 doesn't like the album, that's fine, he's entitled to his opinion. But saying that it "doesn't deserve to be discussed at all" is a bit much.

He does have a really distinct style to it, I dig it

A review must be as objective as possible, not a vent about an album or genre you don't like..
He doesn't even mention the impact it had in the following thirty years.

I don’t like Dimmu Borgir but I don’t made bad reviews on them…
I don’t care.

Just my opinion

It would be better if he gave it a low rating while stating how it affected symphonic black metal for the worse, because it can give us a window into his train of thought

I disagree.
There are certain objective 'facts' that are sometimes worth noting (e.g., "the song has a solo halfway through..."), but this almost always leads to a subjective opinion (e.g., "...but I don't like that solo and it sounds weird").
Reviews are subjective.

Ah, it'll be interesting to see and hear how Enforcer's comeback album fares. I've a feeling Enforcer as we knew it is finally back!

I found it to be really disappointing, and a significant step down from Zenith, which I absolutely loved (contrary to popular opinion). I'm gonna do a full Enforcer discog run in the near future because of this album specifically, and will rewrite the ones I did years ago. I still to this day can't understand how Zenith gets so much hate (outside of "Sail On"). It would be so boring if they made the same speed metal album over and over again, and that's from the guy who thinks Diamonds is the best metal record post-2000.

Edit: And there it is. I disagree with almost every point on Vladimir's review of it, especially about the production being good. It very much isn't, in my opinion.

Actually, Nostagia is quite good - not to the level of Diamonds, but I find myself digging considerably more than Zenith, which has its high points, including underdog "Sail On". Either way, Vlad does this one great justice and I'm looking forward to spying yours as well. As much as I'd like to pump mine out right now, I need to imbibe it properly, lest I indulge in wanton word play which detracts from core musical focus.

Oh, I finally finished my two month long, 120 hour playthru of Marvel's legendary Midnight Suns, to the point where it makes want to write my first vid game review. (Sadly, I had to downgrade from "Heroic" difficulty to "Normal" for the maniacal endgame, despite rocking it with the Indelible Hulk and his insanely OP World Breaker special ability.) It really is a must play for anyone into turned based kombat a la Xcom (2). As they say, it's "all in the cards"...

Yeah I need several more listens first, and I'd rather tackle them in order, so it will be a hot minute.

Tackling their discography sounds like fun!

(As a quick side note, though, I'm not crazy about Nostalgia's self-titled rock ballad smack in the middle of an otherwise rad, Diamonds styled production.)

Of course music like other arts have a component subjective but for me a good review must be beyond the taste of writer…

Want to know if album influenced a decade or is simply a copy of another,if music it’s write good or not,etc
The rules of composition and interpretation are towards the objective end of spectrum from subjective and objective…

Sorry for repetitions…

Hope you understand what I mean

So I've earmarked Vlad's expansive Metallica spew for later perusal over a jumbo bag of dill pork rinds and have to commiserate, as he's not alone in not having written a review for them until now...In fact, maybe not writing one up ever could be its own quirk/reward! On this note, I kind of dug the first three songs but soon fell off (just like how I dropped the turgid and lame Redfall in no time) and have come to reconsider my brief flirtation with disaster.

Also, on the subject of AI, I listened to that Screamer one of mine gas mentioned up above in regards to hypothetical chairbot...it sounds hilariously twisted read out aloud by the computer! (I'm happy Lawrence dug it, so I went back and polished it off some.)

Sorry but I just can't not, have never, and will never jive with the idea that reviews need to aim for some nebulous standard of "objectivity". Every single time it ever gets brought up here it is always ALWAYS in reference to a review that the complainant disagrees with. Zero people in the history of this site have ever been upset that a review they agree with the subjective qualitative assessment of is some failure of objectivity. It never happens, because whether said complainants realize it or not, they are assuming that their own subjective assessment is in some way an objective truth, so when somebody comes to a different conclusion, they must necessarily be doing something wrong. It doesn't work like that. Reviews ARE opinions, full stop. That's what they are by their very nature. If you just want facts and history then just read the sheet music and a Wikipedia article or something.

Reviews do get rejected for factual inaccuracy, but that's in regards to things like "Mercyful Fate is death metal" or "Bruce Dickinson is Judas Priest's singer" or whatever. THOSE are objectively incorrect facts. "Entombed is bad" or "Xasthur is good" are not, they're opinions, and they're the entire goddamned point of reviews. Even then, there is always wiggle room for hot takes with the concession that the reviewer can make a coherent argument for why the weird thing they're saying makes sense to them (like we infamously had a reviewer ragequit the site because he had a review rejected for calling Death's Symbolic "progressive thrash metal", but the problem is that instead of trying to justify why he thought that was a more accurate genre than the accepted consensus through examples, techniques, or influence, he just stated it and moved on). The closest thing you could possibly get to an "objective" qualitative assessment of art would be an aggregate of scores across a wide scope of reviews or ratings, which A) we already do since we show the average review score on the album page, and B) are still just aggregations of opinions in the first place so all that is doing is removing the justification for those scores which would strip them of their context and render them meaningless anyway.

The funny thing is that I don't even like Human666. He's one of the crappier reviewers the site has seen and he obviously liked ruffling feathers by focusing on contrarian reviews with a condescending tone. But if he thinks ITNE sucks then he thinks ITNE sucks and no amount of "yeah but it's really popular" is ever going to change that.

I've gone on about this dozens of times and it never ceases to exhaust me. If you truly want objectivity, then you don't actually want reviews. If you do want both, then what you really mean is that you want people to agree with you. And if you are truly convinced that that isn't what you're upset about, then you're subconsciously exchanging your own subjective opinions and biases for that of an imaginary neutral third party, which is just outsourcing your own opinion to a fuckin ghost.

I'm invested in Enforcer's new one too, and it is kind of a "back to the beginning" style album, what with that damn title shouting it out too. The style fits with me better than Zenith, but I guess I could go back and reevaluate my grumbles about that album now.

Vladimir's review is taken down for now though, because it's a blatant track-by-track, so don't let his enthusiasm sway you too much.

I guess Vlad was so excited he got a little carried away, eh? I know the feeling. Ah, sweetie, your opposing views often baffle me, but this time I'm really looking forward to hear why or how you prefer Zenith over Nostalgia. Granted, that middling titular ballad kills the mood, doesn't it? By the way, I'm still waiting for a little birdie to tell me Ambush also has a new one in the works. In the not-so-meantime, I've an ace up my sleeve for another wicked band's Friday release worth MA (re)commendation...(Hint: The act in question hails from "Jakarandastad" or Tshwane, for the bureaucratically minded.)

a good review taught me that it has an objective side, impact it has on the scene, originality, great songwriting,great riffing and ideas…

One that made a review only subjective is a beginner or a bad reviewer…

In every fields, musical, pictorial or cinematographic….

there is the script, the editing, the sequence shot, the perspective, not just the beauty that each of us perceives differently.

The only reason to read a review for me is to see some new take on something or someone who describes things differently enough from myself that I get some new understanding. There's no real objectivity at all.

If Lee Harrison played in godly mode in Millennium who care if you say that suck or don’t like blast beat…

It’s a fact.

There is no subjectivity at all..

If there was any objectivity in reviewing, then we'd clearly be able to define what's good and bad music, and that just can't be done.

I probably agree with this, but not with your earlier statement about reviews needing to be "as objective as possible".
A balance is important, but the subjective side is more interesting. If there was a golden ratio for the content of each review (which there probably isn't) then I'd say maybe 75/25 in favour of subjectivity.

Ultimately, different people see different things. I disagree with everything in Felix's view of "Fornever Laid to Rest", but I can also see where he is coming from.

It's wild to me that when trying to showcase an example of an objective fact that should be respected and acknowledged in a review, you didn't reach for In the Nightside Eclipse's massive impact on the black metal scene and its wide reaching influence that is still being felt to this day, something that is absolutely factual and is even the impetus for this entire discussion, and instead decided to use how much you like the drumming on a completely different album, which is one of the most nakedly subjective assessments you could've possibly made. Absolutely astounding. Bravo.

We've had this disagreement before and I know I can't change your mind on it so really we're just spinning our wheels here, but I genuinely do think that you just kinda assume that your own opinions are facts and that's utterly flummoxing.

Was an hyperbole..
How difficult it is to distinguish the objective(great drumming) and the subjective(poor drumming)

I agree with Robotiq that a good review must be a part of two side:objective and subjective…
(And my judgment on the most objective review possible was understood on the form, technique,songwriting and yes I like the subjective side on review but in that context)

But if subjective take all we don’t have a review but an opinion as well written as it is.

Ps mine is only my thinking and I don’t have the truth in my pockets…
No want offending anyone

Me as well, I hope I didn't come off as insulting because that wasn't my intent.



This part however does make me wonder if I've been misunderstanding you this whole time though. The least charitable interpretation of this sentence is that you just think the drumming in question is good and therefore objectively true, and saying that it's bad must therefore be objectively false, but I don't think that's what you mean (though the language gap between us does sort of imply it to my understanding). I think, and correct me if I'm wrong, that you're saying that even if you don't personally enjoy the drumming, you're still obligated to at the very least praise whatever technical competency is being displayed.

I'm of two minds on that, and I'll use We are the Nightmare by Arsis as my example here because it's the first thing I think of when I think of drumming that is impressive on a technical level but awful in the context of the album. On one hand, I think it's completely fair to just say that it's terrible, because most writers here are going to go into the necessary detail to explain why, and that explanation in that specific context will almost surely consist of how Darren Cesca is a super busy drummer that hits a million beats extremely quickly (thereby illustrating the technical skill on display) and juxtapose it with how it's very distracting on that album because it takes the lead over the guitars, and therefore makes the album very jumbled and messy (which would explain the subjective portion of why the reviewer doesn't like it). That example doesn't directly examine the ticky-tack technicalities and competency necessary to play like that, but still implies it through description alone. On the other hand, I also think it's good to really highlight how impressive and difficult the drumming is in explicit detail while more lightly following up on why it doesn't work, thereby shifting the balance between coldly explaining the skill and how it does or doesn't gel with the music around it. If I'm understanding you correctly, the first example wouldn't be adequate for you because the hypothetical reviewer doesn't explicitly praise the technical competency, and that's where we disagree on what is necessary for a review.

(Of course, in that example it's equally fine to just think the drumming rules and fits the album well. And I think we'd both agree that it would be absurd to either talk exclusively about how much technical skill it takes while still rating the album poorly without ever explaining why, or to say that the drumming is dogshit and just leaving it there with no further followup (most reviews that simply state something without describing it are never accepted anyway because musical description is the number one requirement of a review here, so this theoretically shouldn't ever happen anyway))

So basically, from my view, I don't think it's entirely necessary to focus on things that are technically true if they aren't relevant to your overall point. The fact that Darren Cesca can play ludicrously quickly and cleanly doesn't diminish the point that his drumming is a major reason why I don't like We are the Nightmare, so I wouldn't really bother praising that skill if it isn't used to a worthwhile effect on the album, and I'm pretty sure that's the exact approach I took in my own review as well. If somebody thinks ITNE is a bad album then I don't think it matters that a lot of other people think it's great, and there's no need to even bring that up if it isn't relevant to the overall thesis of "I don't like ITNE and here's why".



I do however think you're just completely wrong here. All reviews are opinion pieces because reviews are entirely predicated on having an opinion about something. If you're just describing an album without an opinion, then you aren't writing a review, you're writing an analysis. If you're posting a review on the Metal Archives, you're attaching a percentage score to it. If you're attaching a percentage score, then you're making a qualitative assessment. If you're making a qualitative assessment, you're applying your subjective opinions and biases into your piece. Ergo, it is a review, and ergo reviews are opinions. Maybe it's a bit of a tautology but that's because I have no idea how to explain what a review without an opinion even is. That's the entire point. There is no objective way to analyze the outputs of a piece of art and run some calculations to determine whether or not it's good or bad without also applying what you (subjectively) believe "good" and "bad" even mean. It's like clapping without hands, you can't math art, art is not a science, it just does not compute.

And if you (not you specifically, I mean the general "you") do think that you can reach qualitative truth via pure mathematics then you're an ego tripping nerd with an unbelievably inflated sense of self importance. Refer back to what I said about assuming that your own subjective assessment is in some way an objective truth. The people who do that, whether intentionally because they just think they're super duper fucking smart, or unintentionally and just don't realize that that's the process going on in their brain, are always agonizingly insufferable.

then let's take a cinematic example(to understand each other better)Es the Social Network ofDavid Fincher, we can all have conflicting opinions about the value of the film but on one point we should all agree that the technique used by the director to make the film is perfect or almost good(the scene of regatta is simply stunning)
Or the scenography, the dialogues, the originality of the script etc for me all of these things can't just be subjective and stop.

So if we make a negative review of the film we must (the reviewer) take into consideration the technical context of the film and therefore it is not possible to crush it completely(or not?)
This is for me the part objective of a review.

going back to my example of the Emperor a reviewer cannot fail to take into account the musical impact they had and for this alone they cannot be slayed…

You can make a negative review of At Nightside but also taking into consideration the objective aspects of the work and if you give him 55 I have more respect for you.