What on Earth is "The BANGERS Method"?

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What on Earth is "The BANGERS Method"?


Basically, it’s a way of identifying the best record in a band's discography.

One day, I was listening to an album and sent a message to my friends stating that “this album is definitely underrated, I reckon it’s their third best album”. As I thought about this some more, I thought about how I could possibly work this out (turned out I was wrong, by the way!)

With a bit of trial and error, I came up with the below… The BANGERS Method.



1. This process is designed to rank albums based on how many classic tracks from the bands catalogue they contain, in order to definitively rank the albums in best to worst order.

2. In my opinion, an album should be judged on how many great songs it contains. An album full of average songs is never going to be a band’s best album!

3. To begin grading, you need to be familiar with both the album in question and the band’s catalogue. I don’t think you can accurately rate a song without having heard it at least a few times. With a great song, it’s all about how the hook grips you, how it gets under your skin, how the lyrics resonate, how it makes you FEEL, and I don’t think you can get any of this until repeat listens.

4. Each track from an album shall be graded against the following conditions -

a.       Is it a solid “8 out of 10”, for example, if you were putting together a dream setlist for that band, would this be a contender?

b.      Does this track hit the BANGERS (Brilliant And Never Gets Even Remotely Stale) principle of being an all-time classic, one you would never skip in a playlist, one where you sing your heart out at every word.

c.       All scoring is in the context of that band. Marking Evenflow down because it isn’t as good as Heart Shaped Box for example doesn’t help the ranking of that album.

5Scoring is calculated as such:

a.       Every song hitting the ‘Solid 8’ grade is given 1 point.

b.      If a song gets the BANGERS grading, it is assigned an extra half point.

c.       The score is totalled up, giving a score for that album.

d.      The score is then divided by the number of tracks on the album, giving a weighted decimal average. This levels the playing field, stopping albums with more / less tracks being over or under ranked.

  Inclusions and exclusions:

a.       All of the bands studio albums should be included. International bonus tracks should be excluded, as not present on all versions of the albums.

b.      If an album has been remastered, it can replace the original, unless it is significantly reworked / re-recorded, then it would become a new album.

c.       Deluxe versions should only be ranked on the initial album, not bundled B-Sides etc.

d.      B-Side collection / single compilations should be included, as long as the tracks have not been counted elsewhere. Joy Division’s ‘Substance’, Deftones’ ‘B-Sides and Rarities’ as examples would be included, where as something like 'Death to the Pixies' or 'The Very Best of XYZ' would be exempt.

e.      Remix albums can be included if you wish, this is subjective and dependent on the artistic merit of said album.

f.        Substantial EP’s (at least 5 tracks) should be included, but be careful to avoid repetition of lead tracks. ‘Broken’ by Nine Inch Nails is a good example of an includable EP.

g.       Anything recorded live in front of a crowd should be excluded.

h.      Studio live albums can be included, as long as they adhere to point d. Nirvana’s ‘Incesticide’ would be a good example of an album suiting inclusion, whereas ‘The Pixies at the BBC’ would be excluded, due to a large crossover with recorded album material.

7.This is all subjective. The grading is entirely down to the listener, as one man’s trash is another’s treasure, and the inclusions and exclusions are purely my recommendation, based on my grading system.

Over time, I’ll be posting the scores of bands that I’ve looked and how I’ve ranked their discographies, with a paragraph or two about each track that I feel is extra special, or justification for a particularly poor score.

I’ll also post up a link to a Google Docs version of the scoring template, so you can score for yourselves. If you agree or disagree with anything, let me know in the comments, and if you feel so inclined, send me a submission for a band, whether I’ve ranked them or not and I’ll get it added on to the site.

I’ll also be keeping a sort of league table, showing the highest scoring albums overall. It doesn’t mean this album by Band A is better than that one by Band B, but it will show you which albums give you the most bang for your buck.

Cheers!

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