Expecting Rain

In a recent post we discussed the album ratings done in the past and I said I would like to start again a rating process as I already did back in 2014.

Well. I've been working on it and I have it almost ready. That would be done on Google Forms. Is a very long form including all official albums, plus Bootleg Series and other rarities. But I spread the Bootleg Series by periods trying to see, for instance, which outtakes could have made better its albums. I think it wouldn't be so interesting evaluating which Bootleg Series is better, specially as its concept have been evolving. As it's a very long form it's impossible to fill at once, so You'll need to introduce an email (I don't think it needs to be Gmail) to be able to save it and continue in another moment. We should have a long time to vote too. Once the voting period is over, I'll need some time to process the results and then anounce it I don't know how yet. In 2014 I went announcing album by album, chronollogically. We could do it similarly or all at once.... Suggestions accepted.

There can be some errors in it. I'll try to correct it when someone lets me know if it's possible and announce it so that those who already vote it can see it. I took information from various sources available from expectingrain.

We would vote every song and album saying how we feel about it:
0- I hate it / It bores me
1- I can somewhat enjoy it, but it's poor
2- It's OK
3- It's fine
4- It's very good
5- It's a masterpiece

We would do so for the whole album (in the case of albums) and for every song. The album rating will be 3/4 the average of the songs and 1/4 the overall rating, which I did not explore last time. That way the feeling that gives the album, that sometimes is more than a compilation of songs, will be taken in consideration. Let's see how it changes things from last time.

So, we would have information for the following items.
- Best to worst official studio albums rating.
- Best to worst live albums rating. Complete shows or similar to Live albums on Bootleg Series included.
- Song ranking. Including rarities (I know not every rarity is there, I considered those officially releases under the name Bob Dylan or projects involving Bob directly (like The Traveling Wilbuurys or tribute albums).
- Which albums and songs have the highest (and lowest) % of "Masterpiece" ratings.
- Which albums and songs have the highest (and lowest) % of "I hate it/It bores me" ratings.
- Which outtakes have better ranking than songs on an album.

If people is interested I think I could link the whole form in a few days and start the process. I considered waiting for The Bootleg Series 14 to be announced or released but it won't be difficult to make an additional form to complete it all if it happens.

Well... It's ready and I guess we can start it.

Thanks to Nightingale's Code for testing it and finding some error.

By now we could open it until the end of this year. We'll see if we need to let some more time to do it. It's a very long form and You'll need an email to be abel to go back to fill it.

If You find any error please tell me.

I hope You all enjoy it and, remember, no need to be angered if the result is not similar to your opinion and, please, no need to manipulate it filling it as if You were different users. The aim is realize what is the general opinion of the expectingrain users and have a good time with it as it gives a chance to rediscover some of the Bob Dylan's music we could have somehow forgotten because of the huge amount of songs and albums he has made.

https://goo.gl/forms/mlTFOmIKIKEjenLM2

By the way: I know a problem with it is having to pass through all 112 pages of the form to send it and be able to go back to edit it next time. I have found no option to go directly to send the form except putting more information in the same section, making it visually more tiring. The other options were split it in many forms, but it would have made much harder to compile the results and even to give access to you all to the forms.

This way we'll have some interesting graphics made by Google itself automatically. I didn't open the option to see the results to preserve the surprise effect of presenting it and to avoid someone voting trying to change a specific result and not simply giving his opinion.

Thanks for setting this all up!

Thank you for the great effort, GuillemTM!

Before checking all of the 112 pages, how does this work...
Did I understand you correctly that you included each track from Cutting Edge as well as from the 1966 Live Recordings?
Should we rate more than 30 versions of Like A Rolling Stone? That's a lot.

Me personally, I'd be more interested in a poll where we could rate all (or almost all) Bob Dylan songs (maybe even including songs he covered live which haven't been released), but each song only once. So when someone give a rating for LARS, everyone rates "their" (favourite) LARS - which could be either the version from the album, one from the 1966 live collection, the one from Budokan or even from a bootleg from the 90s.

I don't want to distract from this thread, though. Both ratings would be about different things. Whereas in "my" song ranking, each song is about an abstract idea containing multiple versions, "your" song ranking is about looking at each individual track and comparing them all together. I guess both have advantages and disadvantages. I guess I'd like to have a personal list of "my favorite 250 Bob Dylan songs" and 10x LARS inside it would look strange to me.

I understand what You are saying. I think this is somewhere in between. I did't include all the Live 1966 recordings, as I think it's nonsense. I did include all Cutting Edge though (except the false starts), as I feel there are differences between versions there. I don't think there are important ones between one concert and another and would be too difficult to rate, so I didn't considered Live 1966 recordings part of his discography. In fact it doesn't appear in the section "albums" in his web site.

Anyway You can skip things in the form and not vote it. If You don't feel like voting all Like A Rolling Stone versions in Cutting Edge there is no need of that. Maybe someone has a reduced version o the album and can only vote some of them. Or none if You don't want. Of course the more votes the better to rate it properly. Maybe we'll need a minimum of votes (10? 20?) to let the songs be officially rated. And You can skip things and then go back to it and vote them later. No need to do it in chronollogical order.

The lowest part of it all for me is having to skip so many pages everytime You rate something. That makes us need to have some time every time we go at it. But making a poll for album would have made it too difficult at the end to recruit the results.

You are right the most interesting part is rating the albums. And this will be in what I will center my attention.

I invite You to vote only what You feel like to. You will help this keep going and You will enjoy, that's the purpose of that.

I filled out 2 pages last night and when I came back today they were gone. Do I have to click through to the last page to save progress?

Yes. That's the annoying part.

Luckily the shift from one page to another is fast.

I was thinking in the possibility to split it all in 3 or 4 forms to make it easier. but that would mean some votings already done would be lost and You should habve to wait for a while more. Should I do it?

I'm not sure anyone will have the patience to fill out that form. I lost interest before I reached "Freewheelin'"

Maybe I'm a special case.

It's such a cool idea having a definitive rating list. I agree that it should be split over several forms though.

The one run over at Morrissey solo was pretty well done if you're needing inspiration - https://www.morrissey-solo.com/threads/ ... lts.83646/

Discussing every track in a separate thread may be too much for Dylan. But maybe one thread containing a form for each album?

Making a form for each album would be a mess for me then. I can show the results album by album at the end.

I'll try to split it in maybe 4 forms so that it wouldn't be so difficult to go back to it.

And even then You don't have to do it all at once. It's thought to do some and then go back to it.

So please don't start voting and give me maybe a few weeks to get it ready in a better form.

Well, that's ready. I had split it in 4 forms, which makes much more easy to manage. It can be a bit annoying to skip pages as probably You won't fill it all, but it's not the same skipping 20 pages than 100. It also loads much more fastly.

I am sorry for those people who seem to not have read me saying to wait to vote until I had it corrected. I see there were 6 votes now, and when I said that there was only 2 (and one was mine). The votes are only preserved in the 1st form, and it was impossible to preserve it in the rest of it. So those people You'll have to fill again the other parts. I think the proiority is to have as many votes as possible and only this way we will have more people voting.

I had made 4 parts of similar size and fitting in some way different Bob Dylan phases. You could say 1966 would fit better with 1965, but then the sizes of the various forms would be too different.

Here You have the links:
part 1 (1959-1965): https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1VZXYkkoLNqmb37MJzU7dGTNrNyO8G6uzy4mBXU4Ha0g/edit?usp=sharing
part 2 (1966-1976): https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1_VVJCJNrx-i92g_qIm6MG-mU3STXF0cnlkr100hFxKA/edit?usp=sharing
part 3 (1978-1988): https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1pszZ2HKbjLKWisQlcHO4sspCL918raGyBnlvpS77T30/edit?usp=sharing
part 4 (1989-2018): https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1R1cABCGiZZlef1EjBh04LMuxk3OR7V7U4CXI_adof3I/edit?usp=sharing

I see more people have been answeing it. Did it work well for You?

By now, I think I'd close it at the end of the year. I will add the More Blood More Tracks when I know which are already released and which are "new".

Thanks for separating it into separate forms, much easier!


Does this mean we shouldn't fill out the second form if it will be replaced? Or will More Blood stuff get it's own form?

They say everything can be replaced...

Would have been no problem voting it before it was included, as I didn't create the answers sheet unil it was in. The sheet wouldn't be replaced, I have simply added a part on it.

But well... We have a list today and now IT IS INCLUDED ALREADY!

Well, I have a doubt: in the published list there is two "previously released on Blood On The Tracks" versions of Buckets Of Rain. But I decided it must be the second, as the first hasn't bass on it.

I'll open a new thread, as this appears as a poll and I thing it might decrease participation, as people might not read it.

That would be the thread to comment possible errors or problems and then the results.

What should the title be?

What's the interest? Who cares ?

Should this be the title?

The interest is knowing the opinion about Dylan albums and songs. Many people have expressed interest in this and had a big participation (about 60 people) 4 years ago when I did something similar and some times someone else did other similar things.

I understand someone can not be interested in it. Of course I don't expect everybody to be interested. I am interested and I think it's fun.

Excellent title, but I have to say I'd be interested, and will participate.

Why go to a Rolling Stone guide or some other commercial source when the folks who know so much more are often right here??

You may want to ask the mods about stickying it to the top for a few months, just to make sure folks who don't stop in everyday have a chance to see it.

Oh this is really really nice. I'll be doing all four parts in the coming week or so. Looking forward to read the results.

Don't hurry. It will be open until the end of the year to let anyone who wants do it calmly.

You can fill part of a form and then go back to it and edit it to fill what You left empty.

Good idea.

Title?
How about

ER members rank [select] the best of Dylan

I'll do, thanks