Talk:Glass Swords/GA1

GA Review

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Reviewer: Sparklism (talk · contribs) 18:29, 12 October 2014 (UTC)

Overall, this is a pretty decent article, nicely written with broad coverage and NPOV. There are a few (mainly stylistic/grammar) tweaks that should be made to get this to GA status, but these shouldn't be too difficult or take too long.

GA review – see WP:WIAGA for criteria

1. Is it reasonably well written?

   A. Prose is "clear and concise", without copyvios, or spelling and grammar errors:

Lead

• The first two sentences could be combined, something like: "Glass Swords is the debut studio album by Scottish producer Russell Whyte under his alias of Rustie, released by Warp Records in 2011", otherwise the phrase "studio album" becomes repetitive to the reader.

  Done. Andrzejbanas (talk) 21:21, 12 October 2014 (UTC)

• The third sentence is a little unwieldy and needs a comma or two, something like "...between 2008 and 2010 by Whyte, partially in his father's home in Glasgow, Scotland and partly in his own home in London, England."

  Done. Andrzejbanas (talk) 21:21, 12 October 2014 (UTC)

• In the final sentence of the first paragraph, it would perhaps be better to say "worth releasing on the finished version of Glass Swords."

  Done. Andrzejbanas (talk) 21:21, 12 October 2014 (UTC)

• "Glass Swords is an electronic music album that spans many different sub-genres as the BBC described that the songs are "often jamming five or six recognisable influences into a single four-minute track."" - what is this really trying to say here? Is is simpler just to say that the album is musically diverse and that the critics found it hard to classify as anything other than electronic music?

  Done, and yes, that's what I was trying to get at. Andrzejbanas (talk) 21:21, 12 October 2014 (UTC)

Looking at this a second time, while the changes you made are for the better, we now have the phrase "electronic music" in both of the first two sentences of this paragraph. Could these two sentences be combined into one, in order to negate the repetition? — sparklism ^hey! 13:35, 14 October 2014 (UTC)

How about "Glass Swords is a musically diverse album that critics found hard to classify as anything specific other than electronic music."? — sparklism ^hey! 16:39, 16 October 2014 (UTC)

Made it a bit shorter, but basically said the same thing. Andrzejbanas (talk) 20:19, 16 October 2014 (UTC)

I think you misunderstood what I was after here...I was talking about simplifying the lead, not the bit that you had put in the body of the article....Hmm. — sparklism ^hey! 20:41, 16 October 2014 (UTC)

Yeah, sorry misunderstood. Fixed now I think. :) Andrzejbanas (talk) 20:56, 16 October 2014 (UTC)

Got there in the end :) — sparklism ^hey! 04:14, 17 October 2014 (UTC)

• Better to say "The track "Ultra Thizz" was released as a single in 2010 prior to the release of the album in 2011". Also, on this same point, the 'Release' section states that "Ultra Thizz" was released in September 2011 - which is correct, 2010 or 2011?

  Whups. It's 2011 but still before the album's release. Fixed that. Andrzejbanas (talk) 21:21, 12 October 2014 (UTC)

• "...positive reviews from critics including be referred to as one of the best albums of 2011". What does this mean?

Re-phrased this. Should be okay now. Andrzejbanas (talk) 21:21, 12 October 2014 (UTC)

• "...shortlisted on the Scottish Album of the Year Award" - should this be "shortlisted for the.....award"? This is also repeated in the 'Reception' section further down the article.

Re-phrased this. Should be okay now. Andrzejbanas (talk) 21:21, 12 October 2014 (UTC)

You only changed the one in the lead, so I've changed the one in 'Reception' myself. — sparklism ^hey! 16:24, 16 October 2014 (UTC)

Whups! Thank you. Andrzejbanas (talk) 20:19, 16 October 2014 (UTC)

Production

• Nearly every sentence in this section begins with the word "Whyte" which hampers the flow of the article - you might find some pointers to address this here, or you could ask for some collaborative help from someone like WP:GOCE.

Okay, moved those around a bit. Is it better? Andrzejbanas (talk) 22:10, 13 October 2014 (UTC)

Yes, that's better. I've fixed a couple of typos :) — sparklism ^hey! 08:50, 14 October 2014 (UTC)

• "Whyte had stated that he began working on the album...." - the word had is superfluous here.

Removed. Andrzejbanas (talk) 22:10, 13 October 2014 (UTC)

• The second sentence might be clearer as something like "...and in [his own house in] London [after] Whyte had moved there"

Done. Andrzejbanas (talk) 22:10, 13 October 2014 (UTC)

• "Whyte entered production on the album" might be better as "started working on.."

Changed. How's that? Andrzejbanas (talk) 22:10, 13 October 2014 (UTC)

• When talking about the number of tracks, it would be better to write '100' as one hundred and 14 as fourteen.

Done. Andrzejbanas (talk) 22:10, 13 October 2014 (UTC)

• Clearer to say "whittled down the album to a [final] selection of.."

Done. Andrzejbanas (talk) 22:10, 13 October 2014 (UTC)

• Another observation: Is that the right link for Ableton , or do you mean Ableton Live? Also, perhaps you should link the other technical aspects of this paragraph (e.g. "midi guitar controller"/ "midi keyboard"/ "compressors") — sparklism ^hey! 13:35, 14 October 2014 (UTC)

• Going to assume it's Ableton Live as the other one doesn't make sense. :) Linked the other items too. Andrzejbanas (talk) 05:42, 16 October 2014 (UTC)

I think 'compressors' refers to Dynamic range compression. — sparklism ^hey! 16:27, 16 October 2014 (UTC)

Linked now. Andrzejbanas (talk) 20:19, 16 October 2014 (UTC)

Style

• Could we have an introductory sentence to describe the first paragraph? Something about how the critics found the music difficult to categorise, perhaps.

• added something like that. I didn't want to make it sound like they had difficulty, as they just said it sounded like 19 different things at once. Andrzejbanas (talk) 05:42, 16 October 2014 (UTC)

• You haven't consistently wikilinked all of the review sources e.g. Spin and Fact are linked, but MTV and Pitchfork are not.

• wikilinked MTV and Pitchfork Media. Andrzejbanas (talk) 05:42, 16 October 2014 (UTC)

Release

• I'm not sure how the release of Sunburst is relevant - it feels a bit shoe-horned in here. Perhaps it would be simpler just to say that the "Ultra Thizz" single was released ahead of the album, and instead mention Sunburst somewhere at the beginning of the 'Production' section, where you are talking about the start of recording the album etc.

• Moved. I kind of want this still in here as I feel that everything in the infobox should be mentioned in the article itself. This includes the previous and next albums. if you think it's skippable, I'll be happy to remove it. Andrzejbanas (talk) 05:42, 16 October 2014 (UTC)

• "A launch party for Glass Swords on 1 October 2011." does not make sense.

• ..So it doesn't! Fixed. Andrzejbanas (talk) 05:42, 16 October 2014 (UTC)

• Regarding the album cover - could this have it's own subsection, perhaps in the 'Production' section? It feels slightly too late to talk about it here, and it kind of ties in with the stuff about Warp Records from the end of the 'Production' section.

I've had second thoughts about this. The stuff about the cover probably does belong here, but at the start of the section, so we talk about the cover in one paragraph, and the release in the next. Make sense? — sparklism ^hey! 13:47, 14 October 2014 (UTC)

Good idea. Moved! Andrzejbanas (talk) 05:42, 16 October 2014 (UTC)

• I'm not sure we need to mention Green Language here at all, since this section is just about the release of Glass Swords.

Again, this is just for infobox purposes stated above. If you feel it's still not worth it, I'll remove it with no real complaints. :) Andrzejbanas (talk) 05:42, 16 October 2014 (UTC)

Reception

• This is the section that could use a little beefing up. You have some reviews in the review scores box that are not mentioned in the text of this section. The WP:ALBUMS article style guide states that (t)he bulk of the information should be in prose format, though the text may be supplemented with the {{Album ratings}} template, as a summary of professional reviews in table form. The template is not to be a substitute for a section in paragraph form, since a review cannot be accurately boiled down to a simple rating - with this in mind, there should be at least one line of text for each review in the box.
• You also have reviews from the BBC, Exclaim! and Mojo referred to in the text but these are not in the review scores box - is it possible to incorporate these into the reviews box?

• Normally I'd be happy to add them, but I don't have exact scores from them (star ratings, 3/10, etc.) and I don't really like adding "favourable" or "unfavourable" because it tends to lead to edit wars where fans add things like "very favourable", etc. I think the prose speaks for itself. If you want, we can discuss and add proper ratings. :) I'd really like to include Mojo's lower rating specificly as it's one of the few weaker reviews the album got that I could find, but I don't know if their 6/10 as metacritic says is a 3/5 or three stars or what. I don't want to misquote it. Andrzejbanas (talk) 05:42, 16 October 2014 (UTC)

According to Wikipedia:WikiProject Albums/Sources, Mojo uses a five star scale, which I sort of recall from reading it before, and is backed up by their online 'Album of the Week' section, e.g. this review. So, I think it's safe to use if you wanted to include it in the infobox. — sparklism ^hey! 16:21, 16 October 2014 (UTC)

I'd say that makes sense. I've added the star rating. Good idea! Andrzejbanas (talk) 20:19, 16 October 2014 (UTC)

• "MixMag and The Wire placed the album as the second best albums of 2011."

Fixed. I think. Andrzejbanas (talk) 05:42, 16 October 2014 (UTC)

• In any case, Mixmag ranked the album third, not second, in their EOY round-up (according to the Metacritic link provided)

That is true! Fixed. Andrzejbanas (talk) 05:42, 16 October 2014 (UTC)

Track listing

• I notice here that you have only 13 tracks listed, but there were 14 mentioned above. Is the missing track the bonus track for Japan? (there's also the version with a "Warp Mix" on)

WP:ALBUMS doesn't let us use discogs as a source. outside Japanese iTunes, I can't find much information about these bonus tracks from a better source. I'd say maybe I should leave it as it is until I can find a proper source? :/ Andrzejbanas (talk) 05:42, 16 October 2014 (UTC)

1. B. MoS compliance for lead, layout, words to watch, fiction, and lists:

2. Is it factually accurate and verifiable?

   A. Has an appropriate reference section:

   B. Citation to reliable sources where necessary:

   C. No original research:

3. Is it broad in its coverage?

   A. Major aspects:

• This is not an absolute requirement, but just an observation regarding the 'Reception' section. The WP:ALBUMS album style guide says to include no more than ten reviews in table form - for GA class album articles, we would expect to see as close to 10 reviews as we can get without exceeding this. As it stands, we only have 6. Is it possible to get to 10 reviews in the infobox, with a mention in the reception section from each one? (Stressing again: not an absolute requirement, but a 'nice to have..')

See my above comment about why I didn't use some reviews. We can figure it out from there what's the best way to handle it. Andrzejbanas (talk) 05:42, 16 October 2014 (UTC)

1. B. Focused:

2. Is it neutral?

   Fair representation without bias:

3. Is it stable?

   No edit wars, etc:

4. Does it contain images to illustrate the topic?

   A. Images are tagged with their copyright status, and valid fair use rationales are provided for non-free content:

   B. Images are provided if possible and are relevant to the topic, and have suitable captions:

5. Overall:

   Pass or Fail:

   I'll place the review on hold for now to allow these changes to be made. — sparklism ^hey! 18:30, 12 October 2014 (UTC)

   Great! Think I'm mostly done after a few more changes. :) Andrzejbanas (talk) 05:42, 16 October 2014 (UTC)

   Getting very close now, keep up the good work! — sparklism ^hey! 16:31, 16 October 2014 (UTC)

   (Note that I've BOLD-ly made a few changes to wording in the article myself.) — sparklism ^hey! 16:42, 16 October 2014 (UTC)

Looks okay to me! I've made the other changes you've requested. Andrzejbanas (talk) 20:19, 16 October 2014 (UTC)

I think this is good to go now: passing GA. — sparklism ^hey! 04:14, 17 October 2014 (UTC)