Similar to the Game Pass Game Club, would anyone be interested in an Album club?

Hey gang,

I've seen the massive success lately of the Game Pass Game Club, which I really admire, so I got myself to thinking: Maybe we could do the same for music?

I'm thinking something like, once a week, a member picks a seminal album from their life, we all listen to it in our own time, then come back to discuss what we thought of it?

It's still early days, but if you think you'd like to see, or partake in something like that, could you sound off in here? I'd just like to know some early numbers, and if it's even worth doing!

Thanks :D

Sure, probably. It's more easier to get involved than the GamePass stuff.

Sure! That sounds like a great idea.

I like the idea of getting more tech death and prog metal recommendations.

i'm always down to bullshit about music.

Like Albummer but not weird albums.

@csl316: More like Al-Banger.

This sounds rad!

I hardly even know her?

I'd be down for this. I listen to Anthony Fantano talk about new music more than I actually listen to new music, so I could use the push to get new stuff in my playlists.

Sure! I'll give it a try.

It already was a thing about 15 years ago called Lala if I remember correctly. You we're able to trade and exchange and I think buy Cd's as well. Even had a huge focus on stream well before it was common. Within, a year or so Apple bought them up, did nothing with them and killed the service.

I was honestly just going to use a Google Spreadsheet and Spotify!

Yeah, anything should be within reach via youtube/vimeo/spotify/whatever. There's no need for tape trading unless this is a ploy to get us into underground hardcore rap. And I'm sure they've already got a bandcamp or soundcloud.

Exactly! My first album I want to share is something really basic, but really close to my heart anyway!

Once all the Jeff stuff cools off, I'll get us started :D

I'm down! Need to try some new stuff.

I'm keen!

I would love to contribute to this. Share the spreadsheet or platform and I'll pitch it for sure.

Sounds fun! I am always down to try new music and my tastes are very broad so I’ll be down tp try whatever. And since I have been on a real death core trip lately, I could use some palette cleanser music.

Sooooooo... I'll just leave this here, and we'll see what happens by next week.

I also found myself wondering where this thread had gone earlier today.

I'm curious to know how people with more, uh, "normal" musical tastes will react to this. Also I don't listen to much tech death (I am more an Opeth or Amon Amarth man) but I'm glad to see vocoded vocals still around in that genre twenty years after Cynic's Focus came out, even if these sound more like Entheos than Cynic for whatever reason.

EDIT: And now I have heard good ol' fashioned sung vocals, which I was not expecting.

I can get down with the instruments, but I just can't with the growling. I've never found a song where I can get past it, aside from some songs that have a few brief growls, but then sung (or at least shouted) vocals the rest of the time. It just doesn't do anything for me. As such, Sons of Belial was not bad, and the last two tracks were ok.

Which is why I'm thinking that three albums of significantly different genres will inspire more people to participate. To use my taste for example, if someone recommends jazz, country, or deathcore, I ain't gonna have shit to say other than "Nope, still don't like that kind of music."

So, for the sake of drafting a plan to build upon: We get in two more albums for this first week; I do have two others in mind in case nobody else wants to suggest anything. For next week, or, whenever we figure everything out, participants can suggest an album or two for up to nine albums that we can add to a wheel. As for who spins the wheel and "determines" which albums we'll listen to during a week, we should have a couple of arbiters (which can also be picked by a wheel), preferably people who show up on the forums pretty often. The honor system isn't perfect, but I doubt that anyone is willing to go the extra mile to set up a Twitch or YouTube stream in order to show that the results weren't falsified, so, honor system is it. And after the selected three albums have been listened to and reviewed, those are off of the wheel, we can talk about whether the albums that weren't selected either stay on the wheel or the wheel gets wiped, new albums get added on a first-post-first-added basis at one or two suggestions per person (the number of suggestions of which can be adjusted depending on how many people participate), a new wheel spinner gets picked (though if that person misses a deadline, another arbiter should take the reins on a whoever posts first basis), rinse, and repeat.

Also, I just remembered that time zones are a thing and that their can be some debate between whether a week begins with Sunday or Monday. So, unless there are some strong objections in regards to one, the other or both, a week is between Monday 12:00 AM EST and Sunday 11:59 PM EST, the voting period for the next week can be between Friday 12:00 AM EST and Sunday 11:59 PM EST, and the selected wheel spinner has until Tuesday 11:59 PM EST to post the new list.

I can organize this better when necessary.

I think that may be overcomplicating things at this point. Maybe get a couple weeks in on suggestions and discussion, then branch out to the full game show rules if the interest is there.

I've certainly got albums to suggest, but they are generally the more standard new wave/alternative/classic rock type. The question is do we lean more towards significant albums for individuals, seminal albums in music history, or music exploration?

@redwing42: Well, as I've said about a month ago, I'm here for the possibility of more tech death and prog metal recommendations, and maybe also black metal if it don't sound like it was recorded in an abandoned sex dungeon; figuring that actual humans might be more effective at bringing me something that's relevant to my interests better than an algorithm. So to answer your question, I'm here for exploration, but only to the extent of what's already in my comfort zone, which brings me to the realization that I might be better off with going back to last.fm since their genre tagging system was very useful in finding what are now my current favorite groups if extreme metal is too fringe for this community. (Yes, I know The Metal Thread exists, but that covers the umbrella genre in its vast entirety as opposed to focusing on the few specific sub-genres that I'm the most interested in.)

But with all that said, I don't mind being wrong if I can gain something from it, so I welcome the off chance of someone mentioning a group or an album from a genre that I'd normally call safe, milquetoast, generic or cringe and I can actually fuck with it.

I didn’t respond to this at the time, but if it ever gets some tread on the ground, I’m prepared to sing along babe!

Sorry, I've been mad busy putting on a play at the school I work at!

this weekend I'll put things together :D

Please check your inboxes, I've sent out invites to the Google Sheet, and some preliminary details!

Sorry for taking so long, I work in a primary school, and fitting in everything in the last 4 weeks is always chaos!

@sombre: Can I get an invite?

I'll add you to the DM!

Despite the fact I added every single person in this thread to the DM, it only added about 4 people. That's annoying. I'll add you all manually tomorrow

Oh, goodie; the thing where you can't sent a PM to a person who isn't following you thing because the Giant Bomb user base constantly harass each other for lunch money.

Feel free to change that setting people. We're setting up a music club, not asking for social security numbers.

That's probably more to do with the frequency of bots on this site but okay.

@facelessvixen said:

Oh, goodie; the thing where you can't sent a PM to a person who isn't following you thing because the Giant Bomb user base constantly harass each other for lunch money.

Feel free to change that setting people. We're setting up a music club, not asking for social security numbers.

It probably sets it by that as default. I'll give people on here a few days to sort it out. @ me on here when you'e sorted it peeps :)

I followed you, can you try to add me again?

I've followed. Let's see if that does anything.

Don't bot me bro. But try adding me again.

Last call for being added to the DM.

I'm gonna get the whole thing rolling this week, so if you've been missed out, please comment in this thread so I can get you in :)

It's happening. ...It's happening!

...It's fucking happening! For real this time!

The GB Album Club on Discord.

Just joined up, I'm both excited and scared of having to expand my musical taste with you fine folks.