Evermind, I know you probably don't care, but I would have called Sacul's song a mess, too, after just one listen. It really came together on subsequent listens, discounting the first 3 minutes, which I still am not keen on.
I knew you wouldn't be happy that I spotted you only a half point instead of a full point as you were expecting. I feel strongly that your song was the better one, but I also feel strongly that 8.5 and 9 are the correct scores for the two songs in question. At least Tyrias made it so it's not only my fault, and so it wasn't a half-point margin, leaving a chance for you to play in my V2 when that happens in 2073. Also, I will casually draw your attention to the grand total, in which I am the judge who gave you the more points than anyone in the roulette, and therefore the one who made it this close. All in hopes of you not hating me, naturally. As before, I appreciate your submissions—I will definitely be checking Joan Baez, Blind Guardian, Fish, Amadeus Awad, Mark Knopfler, Jethro Tull, Absolute Priority and David Gilmour. And I've already checked Avantasia. And I'll probably get Roger Waters' album because that song won't leave my head even though I dislike it lyrically. So basically almost everything you sent. Damn, your performance was consistent! Thanks for playing!
Nekov, I'm sure it's disappointing to make it this far and then drop behind in the finals. Though I may not have been as keen on your later submissions, you sent some of my favorite songs of the whole thing in the first tier. Hammock-Dream the Electric Sheep-Pure Reason Revolution was probably the best performance by a contestant on a single tier as far as I'm concerned. I'll definitely check all those artists, as well as several others of yours: Lights & Motion, Faunts, Nordic Giants, Papadosio and probably Subsignal, actually. Thanks for playing!
Sacul, congratulations on your big win! You and I don't always see eye-to-eye, but in this case you got me just enough of the time to collect the points needed to get the win. When you get into those atmospheric and emotional songs, that's when you and I can get along and enjoy the same thing, and you finally got onto a groove of those, really from round 7 onward: Saltillo, Alt-J, Bowie, Florence + The Machine and, despite the glitches, Kashiwa Daisuke. These are all artists I'll check out, plus Lord Huron and probably Riverside via their latest. Thanks for playing, obviously, and congratulations!
I'll probably do a thing tomorrow where I list my favorite songs of the roulette, maybe do rankings of each person's submissions, that sort of thing. Should be fun.