DTF's Top 50 Bands/Artists Countdown Thread! (the final list)

[ReaperKK]

The countdown has begun. With over 400+ artists there was a suggestion to do a top 50. I think that's a great idea so I will start with 50 and do 2-3 spots a day until we get to 25 where I'll go down to one update a day.

Lists Received:
Buddyhunter1
Metropolaris
DTwwbwMP
Trav86
soupytwist
nobloodyname
Pappy
Fonzie
Sacul
TheHoveringSojourn808
Vmadera00
Setlist Scotty
CharlesPL
SwedishGoose
Stadler
WilliamMunny
Dream Team
pg1067
Nachtmerrie
HOF
PMSummer
twosuitsluke
ReaperKK
The Great Zo
Lethean
jingle.boy
devieira73
WardySI
coz
SomeoneLikeHim
elefantStone
TAC
Evermind
The Letter M
Dave_Manchester
bosk1
King Puppies and the Acid Guppies
romdrums
jammindude
Zydar
DragonAttack
Zoom E
LithoJazzoSphere
MustActFastToCoverUp
wolfking
nick_z

Rank:
50t. Miles Davis
50t. Symphony X
49.  Agalloch
46t. King Crimson
46t. Avenged Sevenfold
46t. Scorpions
44t. The Dear Hunter
44t. Frank Zappa
43.  Evergrey
42.  UFO
40t. Godspeed You! Black Emperor
40t. Nightwish
39.  Katatonia
38.  Helloween
37.  Between The Buried And Me
36.  Anathema
35.  Radiohead
33t. Big Big Train
33t. Peter Gabriel
32.  Megadeth
31.  Riverside
30.  Kiss
29.  Ayreon
28.  Spock's Beard
27.  Neal Morse
26.  Pain Of Salvation
25.  Devin Townsend
23t. Coheed & Cambria
23t. Mastodon
21t. Queen
21t. Tool
20.  Black Sabbath
19.  Transatlantic
18.  Marillion
17.  Judas Preist
16.  Opeth
15.  Yes
13t. Van Halen
13t. Steven Wilson
12.  Fates Warning
11.  Haken
10.  Led Zeppelin
09.  The Beatles
08.  Queensryche
07.  Genesis
06.  Pink Floyd
05.  Porcupine Tree
04.  Metallica
03.  Iron Maiden
02.  Rush
01.  Dream Theater

[jingle.boy]

Posting to remember to come back to this.  Top 3 are set in stone, it'll be fun to see how I stack the remaining 22.

[twosuitsluke]

This’ll be great. Honestly not sure many of mine will make the final list, but here’s hoping. I hope we can get as many people involved in this as possible.

[Cool Chris]

I'll get in on this.

[King Puppies and the Acid Guppies]

I'm not sure I'll have time to do this. I'm leaving on vacation tomorrow and won't be back until the end of the month. I'll see if I can scratch out some time while on vacation.

[Buddyhunter1]

Could probably whip something up for this, though beyond my like, top 5 I honestly don't give much thought as to the order of my favorites. But that's half the fun of these threads, I suppose.

[twosuitsluke]

I knocked up a top 25 pretty easily. I won’t submit yet as there might be some slight adjustments, but it’s pretty set. I’m not surprised to find my top 25 sways towards thrash and punk bands.

[Adami]

Should be fun! Can’t imagine more than a handful ending up on the final list.

[Jamesman42]

Posting to remember to come back to this.

[Buddyhunter1]

Sent mine. A good mix of DTFcore and some bands I'll probably be the only one ranking.

My ranking was largely determined by the quality of the studio albums, though there were a couple bands where being particularly great live may have bumped them up slightly.

[Adami]

Also, before we get started.

Stadler….my love….there will be many classic artists not on the big list that you think should be and that other bands wouldn’t exist without.

It’s going to be okay. Remember, we love you.

[twosuitsluke]

[HOF]

So is “bands” literal, or could it include solo acts?

I’m in for sure either way, just need to clarify before I make my list.

[twosuitsluke]

So is “bands” literal, or could it include solo acts?

I’m in for sure either way, just need to clarify before I make my list.

Oh, that’s a good point. My list will be reviewed if we are adding solo artists.

[TheHoveringSojourn808]

got my list in. looking forward to the full game!

[LithoJazzoSphere]

So is “bands” literal, or could it include solo acts?

I’m in for sure either way, just need to clarify before I make my list.

Though Reaper and I didn't talk about it, since I'm the one who suggested the idea in the first place, I imagine it should be either, and I'd probably have said "artists" if I had created the OP.  Certainly some of my own top 25 are more of solo individuals than bands, per se. 

One of my biggest challenges is going to be deciding on a number of artists who have side projects where they're still some combination of the primary songwriter/instrumentalist/vocalist, but the projects have separate names and possibly different auxiliary musicians.  Of those, which one to choose and how much to factor in the other projects into my ranking of the one I select, using the one I choose as a proxy for their varied body of work. 

Working on my top 50 albums project gave me the impetus to try and sort this whole idea out better than I ever have, and I got my latest run down to a top 26, but deciding on who to cut is murder, and by the time of submission the next half-dozen I had already taken off might appeal to me more again. 

[HOF]

So is “bands” literal, or could it include solo acts?

I’m in for sure either way, just need to clarify before I make my list.

Though Reaper and I didn't talk about it, since I'm the one who suggested the idea in the first place, I imagine it should be either, and I'd probably have said "artists" if I had created the OP.  Certainly some of my own top 25 are more of solo individuals than bands, per se. 

One of my biggest challenges is going to be deciding on a number of artists who have side projects where they're still some combination of the primary songwriter/instrumentalist/vocalist, but the projects have separate names and possibly different auxiliary musicians.  Of those, which one to choose and how much to factor in the other projects into my ranking of the one I select, using the one I choose as a proxy for their varied body of work. 

Working on my top 50 albums project gave me the impetus to try and sort this out whole idea out better than I ever have, and I got my latest run down to a top 26, but deciding on who to cut is murder, and by the time of submission the next half-dozen I had already cut might appeal to me more again.

I was kind of hoping it was strictly bands, because I’m gonna have to make more choices if we include solo artists. But whichever you guys want it to be is fine.

[LithoJazzoSphere]

15. caroline polachek

It's fascinating to see people choose relatively recent artists (or as a manifestation of my side project dilemma, are you factoring in Chairlift and other work of her's?).  I imagine some lists will basically only include artists from people's childhood/teens, and others could have more recency bias, and that's another ongoing struggle for mine. 

[LithoJazzoSphere]

I was kind of hoping it was strictly bands, because I’m gonna have to make more choices if we include solo artists. But whichever you guys want it to be is fine.

Given that we're unlikely to do a separate ranking for artists (unless there's a huge clamor for it), I would think it's best to just be all-encompassing and make this a snapshot of DTF's overall favorites at this point in time.  The personal agony of separating the two is part of the fun, as I alluded to. 

[TAC]

*snip*
here's my list. looking forward to the full game!

HS808, the way it works is you send your list to Reaper via PM, and once he compiles the list, he'll run the countdown. We don't posts lists beforehand. We update our lists when one of our picks is revealed, and then we all share at the end. You might want to edit your post.

[TheHoveringSojourn808]

thanks

[TAC]

thanks

You're welcome. These countdowns are pretty fun.

[LithoJazzoSphere]

*snip*
here's my list. looking forward to the full game!

HS808, the way it works is you send your list to Reaper via PM, and once he compiles the list, he'll run the countdown. We don't posts lists beforehand. We update our lists when one of our picks is revealed, and then we all share at the end. You might want to edit your post.

Yeah, personally I don't care as much about Kev's "no spotlighting" implicit rule in the older versions of these, and don't mind if people give specific examples from time to time, but it would definitely still be best not to actually post the full lists in the thread just yet to give a bit more air of mystery to the results. 

[twosuitsluke]

I’m happy to go with the consensus, but my personal vote would be for the list to combine bands/artists.

[LithoJazzoSphere]

I always struggle with styles in these.  Jazz and electronic music are arguably two of my top three overall genres, but tend to be packed with a lot more mid-tier favorites than absolute top favorites, so I wind up looking like even more of a metalhead than I actually am. 

[ReaperKK]

So is “bands” literal, or could it include solo acts?

I’m in for sure either way, just need to clarify before I make my list.

Oh, that’s a good point. My list will be reviewed if we are adding solo artists.

Bands and solo artists, anything from David Bowie to Dream Theater.

[twosuitsluke]

I can’t see Dream Theater making anyone’s list.

[LithoJazzoSphere]

I can’t see Dream Theater making anyone’s list.

The fun thing will be finding out how large is the gap between #1 and #2.      I'm sure we all have ideas about who the top 5 might be already.

[Dave_Manchester]

*deleted post, sent by mistake*

[twosuitsluke]

I can’t see Dream Theater making anyone’s list.

The fun thing will be finding out how large is the gap between #1 and #2.      I'm sure we all have ideas about who the top 5 might be already.

If the ‘favourite guitarist’ thread is anything to go by, I’d say it’ll be quite large. Will be interesting to see if they don’t make someone’s list.

[LithoJazzoSphere]

They definitely won't be making some people's lists. 

[Jamesman42]

I can only rank 16 before I am just in a sea of artists and bands where I like some stuff and it wouldn't be genuine to rank a top 25 for me.

[coz]

As difficult as that was, I just sorted a list.  Sure we can't make it our top 114? 
Still not sure about my 23-29ish.  Might have to do some list tweaking before submitting.

Are we still gonna do the top bass players?  Or did I miss it?

[Metro]

List sent!

[soupytwist]

List send.  I would say one of mine is a cert for the final list, and 3 others could appear (maybe 5 at most) - the rest probably not.