Talk:Dungeons & Dragons (album)

Previous official soundtracks for D&D

Here's more info on the other D&D soundtracks. So, technically, the Midnight Syndicate soundtrack isn't the "first" officially licensed soundtrack for D&D.

Craig Stuart Garfinkle[1] composed the first soundtrack for Dungeons & Dragons (when TSR owned the francise). His album, entitled Songs of the Dragon[2] was sold independently by the artist and by TSR as a D&D accessory, with the artist retaining all rights to his music yet providing TSR (subsequently Wizards of the Coast, and now Hasbro) the master and synchronization rights.[3] Garfinkle also scored music for the D&D video game Forgotten Realms: Baldur's Gate - Dark Alliance II(2004)[4]

Justin Burnett scored the official D&D soundtrack, entitled Dungeons & Dragons" (2000)[5] for the movie.[6]

In addition, several other musicians scored soundtracks for Dungeons & Dragons movies[7]and the television series in 1992[8] and 1993[9] Ebonyskye 03:18, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

Do you have a source other than the artist claiming that the first one is an official soundtrack for the game? J Milburn 03:27, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

Do you mean the cd booklet? I could probably find out. But look at the guy's credits on IMBD[10]. He does all the music for tv shows and movies, an award winner says IMDB. It's not just some band burning cds and making outrageous claims. It IS weird that the cd is not on Amazon or anything. Maybe the guy has so much work he just doesn't care. TSR is no longer, so maybe he just left the cd to gather dust. But there is a Paypal link, so it is for sale. Ebonyskye 10:37, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

I meant third party claims, or something official from WotC, TSR or Hasbro? J Milburn 11:50, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

Does anyone have anything official NOW? It's like 20 years old. The internet didn't even exist then. So no, nothing official and I don't know anyone who would have it or where to find it. But IMDB has been accepted before. You accept the Midnight Syndicate bio as fact, so why not this other composer's bio, (who's been in the business a lot longer)? What do we have to show that the Midnight Syndicate bio is true? I see some that is part fact but also a lot of hype. There's tons of composeres listed on the games and movies that did music for D&D for years (since 1983), and it's all officially licensed. Hey, I feel like I am being grilled for just pointing out a few other artists. What gives? Ebonyskye 02:06, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

It's not the Midnight Syndicate website you are arguing with, it is the WotC website. Please take a read of this. J Milburn 21:15, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

Oh, and IMDB is not reliable. Realise also that I am not talking about the various video games here, I am talking about soundtracks to the pen and paper role-playing game. J Milburn 21:19, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

I see. Well, I have seen other editors use IMDB as a source, so I thought it was an approved reference source (at least it's not editable by just anyone). So, how I see it is that TSR licensed the first D&D RPG soundtrack to Craig Stuart Garfinkle (that was not for a video game, by the way), then as WotC became the new owners, they licensed a new soundtrack to Midnight Syndicate. I still think Craig Stuart Garfinkle's album should be recognized as being the first, just as TSR was the first publisher of D&D. Ebonyskye 07:36, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Since you do not accept IMDB, here's the credits on his label's website, Midiot Music [11]. You'll see the song credits for the D&D songs listed separately, and assigned to TSR. Ebonyskye 10:55, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Out of respect for Mr. Garfinkle's album from 20 years ago, I just can't accept "first and only" for this band. I just removed that and instead specified "for Wizards..." I think that should suffice and not sound too "hyped."Ebonyskye 11:05, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

Say hello to policy. J Milburn 11:42, 22 August 2007 (UTC)

I read policy. It states that the primary source should be an impartial third party, preferably an established news source, but if not available, then the biography of a well known person is fine. IMDB is an impartial party, and Garfinkle is a well know individual who has MANY credits to his name. The only supporting sources you have is a Midnight Syndicate press release with a quote from a person who only says he is happy with the music. There is nothing there written by WotC about "first and only". The statement is the same as the band's press release on their website and on several other sites and appears to be in their own words. But, then again, this IS wikipedia, so I guess we can't really expect true encyclopedic research if all one has to go with are band press releases. Ebonyskye 00:20, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

You evidently are not reading policy, or reading my sources. IMDB is NOT a reliable source, and the source I am relying on for that comment is not a Midnight Syndicate press release, but a quote from one of the people in charge of the issue at the WotC end, and, I'm sorry, but I think the people at WotC are qualified to know about the history of Dungeons & Dragons. The WotC website does not publish press releases- it isn't a music news site. It releases information relevant to it's customers- people who play it's role-playing games, such as myself. You are proposing that WotC actually doesn't know about the history of Dungeons & Dragons, and the people who do are some down and out eighties music artist, and some anonymous editor over at IMDB. Is this not what you are saying? J Milburn 10:54, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Hi J Milburn. I have done some more fact checking and have compiled quite a list here. User:Ebonyskye/Sandbox It appears that your original complaint about this music by Garfinkle not being for the RPG format is incorrect. All the songs are to accompany the pen and paper games (though the songs were also released on other album compilations that accompanied the books). They are not for video games or the like, which I think was your first concern. So, according to this, I really do not think we can safely say that the Midnight Syndicate album is the only officially licensed album, nor the first. Aside from Garfinkle's "Songs of the Dragon" there is the "First Quest" music album, which features a wide range of musicians, and it has the D&D stamp right on it. Let me know what you think. Ebonyskye 00:50, 27 August 2007 (UTC) returned to fix typoEbonyskye 00:57, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

Right, well, this source is rather valuable, but alarm bells are ringing with the explanation that- "The music was born out of Dungeons and Dragons rich history and excellent product, but there is no formal relationship between our CD, "Songs of the Dragon" and TSR Inc., Wizards of the Coast Inc., or Hasbro Inc.. This is simply one of those rare occasions where an artist was able to protect the rights to his creation and now technology is allowing him to share it with the world." from here. However, I will work something in to the article. J Milburn 12:01, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

It's just occurred to me that the Filmtrax album is actually nothing to do with the Garfinkle album. J Milburn 12:06, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

I have modified the article significantly, on the subject of it being the first soundtrack and on other subjects. However, I am still lacking a decent source for the Garfinkle album, and so I have omitted any mention of that. I am still actively working on the article, so I may come across one shortly. J Milburn 13:58, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

Hi All, Craig Stuart Garfinkle here. I find this dialog fascinating.

The music I created was for audio cd's that were released in conjunction with books and pre-made boards that were released by TSR as "Dungeons and Dragons" games. They had titles like, "Hail the Heroes," "Planescape, a Guide to the Outlands," and a host of others. There was also a TV special called "Dragonstrike" designed as both a game and as a "Dungeons and Dragons" instructional video.

The reason the original CD doesn't exist anymore is that I have moved on. I am currently composing for "World of WarCraft" and other projects where I am able to do so much more technically than I could do so many years ago, that I would have to recreate all of the old music from scratch to bring it to contemporary standards.

Finally, "Songs of the Dragon V2" is now on iTunes - featuring music from my score to "Baldur's Gate, The Dark Alliance II."

If you have any other questions, please feel free to reach out to me on FaceBook. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.88.133.211 (talk) 03:43, 17 September 2014 (UTC)

Thanks! 68.57.233.34 (talk) 03:55, 17 September 2014 (UTC)

Reference

There are two references in this article to a website (abbreviated LOTN in the refs) that does not satisfy WP:Verifiability because it is self-published by Joseph Vargo and there is no editorial control. The sole aim of the entire site is to discredit Midnight Syndicate and it's founder, Edward Douglas. Thatcher131 noted on Ebonyskye's talk page (archived) that the website was considered original research and was, therefore, not reliable. - Skinny McGee 13:43, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

Joseph Vargo can be considered an expert on Midnight Syndicate, so what he says on the subject, whether or not they have a standard editorial procedure, can be considered relevant. Also, original research is invalid here- it is cited to a source, and the source does say that, and so the question is not whether the research is original, (as it is not original to Wikipedia, which is all that that policy is about) but whether the source for the research can be considered reliable. However, it is only fair that this source is treated with a pinch of salt, and so I have adjusted the section in question to verify that it is what Vargo claims only, and that it may or may not be true. J Milburn 13:55, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

Thanks for getting back to me. However, I still don't think that website has any place in this article. Per the Verifiability policy:

Questionable sources are those with a poor reputation for fact-checking or with no editorial oversight. Questionable sources should only be used in articles about themselves. Articles about such sources should not repeat any contentious claims the source has made about third parties, unless those claims have also been published by reliable sources.

So, the way I interpret that, the reference would be acceptable in a Joseph Vargo article, but has no place here. Thanks. - Skinny McGee 14:02, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

We know that the source is definitely written by him, and he is a valid source of information on Midnight Syndicate, due to his obvious links to the band. This is as good as an article about the band, and he is as good as an ex-member of the band. As you can now see in the article, I am not using his word as an explanation of what did happen, but as an explanation of what he claims happened. Whether the reader believes what he says is up to them. I can see where you are coming from. I am going to try and get a third opinion on this. J Milburn 14:21, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

Sounds good. Thanks. - Skinny McGee 14:34, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

OK, i was asked to take a look at this source issue. A few things are important.

• Is there a conceivable other source that is reliable and says the same
• Is the particular information that is being sourced in this article with this specific source as disputed as the some of the other information
• Does the wikitext make clear the distinction between the 2 viewpoints in the dispute.

Those were the primary things that I kept in mind when looking at this.

1. The claim (vargo sent the gamedevs the albums) is being made on that website, and as such that website is the primary source of that claim. So for that claim, the source is reliable and verifiable.
2. This is something else than the FACT. We do not know what the truth is, so as long the wikitext represents that it might not be true there is no problem.
3. I'm unaware of a source that has disputed him on this specific account. Even if he "was not part of the band" (which seems to be the dispute), he might still have send them the albums. We don't know

So I see no problem for this source for these 2 specific lines in the article that use the source. It's 100% correct to use it in the context of a claim instead of a fact. It would of course be better if other sources can be found that verify this information so that all forms of speculative wording can be removed from the article text, but that is something totally different. --TheDJ (talk • contribs) 15:21, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

Addendum. There is potentially a situation, where everything on that website might be so unreliable, that the entire claim might not be eligible for inclusion (patent nonsense), but to me this looks highly unlikely, since at least on some points he could proof to be right (most notably the Wizards of the Coast letters), from what I could gather about this case. --TheDJ (talk • contribs) 15:30, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

Even if it is incorrect, we are not claiming that it is correct, only that he claims it. J Milburn 15:53, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

(edit conflict)Thanks for your input. I understand what you are saying, but I keep going back to the policy on questionable sources which I quoted above. In relevant part:

Articles about such sources should not repeat any contentious claims the source has made about third parties, unless those claims have also been published by reliable sources.

I think the band would certainly find the claim that Joseph Vargo "forge(d) the link between the band and Dungeons & Dragons game designers" to be contentious and not in keeping with the information published by reliable sources that is cited elsewhere in the article (which shows that Wizards of the Coast and Midnight Syndicate being at several conventions together is what actually forged the link). - Skinny McGee 15:56, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

They do not directly contradict it, and I think it is entirely possible that the band deliberately avoids mentioning the matter due to their mix up with Vargo. I mean, is it really likely that the band goes to one convention, and is approached by a multi-million dollar/pound/euro or whatever multinational corporation to produce the 'first' (see above...) official soundtrack to the roleplaying game that started it all? I think not. Of course, that is my speculation, but that's going against your speculation that the band will mind. In any case, I very much doubt that the band would contend that Vargo says that, which is all the article says. J Milburn 16:20, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

Wow. Sorry if I offended you - that was not my intention. I was just discussing my interpretation of the Verifiability policy to make sure that the reference was appropriate. I still think (since the entire website is highly suspect) that the reference has no place in a Midnight Syndicate-related article, but I will defer to the opinion of more experienced editors. - Skinny McGee 16:27, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

No, sorry, not offended, and apologies if I have/do say anything that offends you. J Milburn 19:25, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

The problem is that most of that what you (McGee) quoted is to protect "living people" from libelous baseless attacks made by others. But there is nothing wrong with documenting and reporting in an article about a business (bands are businesses) dispute that is as far as I can see (i knew nothing about these people until 3PM CEST) at least not baseless. It is not black and white, it is gray. If these people have an issue, then it is up to them to solve that issue, and not up to us to decide who is right and who is wrong. We show both sides and let them fight it out. From what I have read I wouldn't dare to say that Vargo is fully incorrect, nor that the band is fully correct. Neither do I particularly care who is. In the mean time, I think we should show something from both sides. And even though the band may consider this contentious, in all honestly it's not. It's two stupid little companies that wanna fight each-other over their shared history and are doing it in a very mano-a-mano way. I haven't seen any proof that one or the other party is consistently lying and providing false information, so to call statements from either one of the parties contentious is contentious in itself. We do not include information from people who are known to lie, but if both parties say the other is lying, then who are we to decide which of the two is lying? We should wish them good luck with settling that and ignore them until one of them shows us some proof. --TheDJ (talk • contribs) 19:08, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

That's a very good way of looking at it. J Milburn 19:25, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

P.S. this is also where notability kicks in. WP:V says: "unless those claims have also been published by reliable sources". We are getting to a point in Wikipedia, where for a larger set of topics this is becoming increasingly more difficult. If not much is written about a topic, then it becomes more difficult to find proper secondary sources for that topic. At some point, there is only so much we can do as editors and the best is just to let the future write the history. Also, there is no such thing as "reliable media". That is a simplification that we make for fellow readers to keep such a guideline understandable. There is "media that is more reliable than other media on a certain subset of topics". Grey, not black and white. That goes for all of these types of guidelines. As long as we are careful with what we actually say/write about specific people, this little bit (i mean, we already spent 8KB discussing 2 simple lines) of text will do no harm and will reflect well enough both sides of the dispute, until court documents become available, or books are written :D --TheDJ (talk • contribs) 20:23, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

I'm glad the research I provided on the other D&D albums helped. I am thinking of buying the Garfinkle album just to get a look at the credits on it. I wish I could get First Quest. I saw it on ebay but it was a book without the audio. As for all this talk on "Thou Who Shall Not Be Named" the artist's website has a long list of interviews from over the years, some that predate the Midnight Syndicate breakup. I have yet to read them all, but maybe there's something reliable in there that helps support what the guy is saying on the LOTN site. Here's the link[12]. There's also some interviews on the LOTN site itself, possibly cross-linked, I'm not sure. I did notice though that his poster (Born of the Night) is dated from 1993. I actually got one of those from Hot Topic a few years ago. Ebonyskye 14:20, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

GA Review

GA review (see here for criteria)

1. It is reasonably well written.

   a (prose): b (MoS):

2. It is factually accurate and verifiable.

   a (references): b (citations to reliable sources): c (OR):

3. It is broad in its coverage.

   a (major aspects): b (focused):

4. It follows the neutral point of view policy.

   a (fair representation): b (all significant views):

5. It is stable.

   

6. It contains images, where possible, to illustrate the topic.

   a (tagged and captioned): b lack of images (does not in itself exclude GA): c (non-free images have fair use rationales):

7. Overall:

   a Pass/Fail:

Overall I think that you've done an excellent job with the article. There are, however, a few minor things that I feel need to be corrected before I can pass the article.

1. The lead needs to be referenced, even if the facts and details from the lead are later repeated and expanded upon in the article itself.

    Not done See below. J Milburn 22:00, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

   Permanently stricken, per below. Cheers, CP 22:27, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

2. The article needs to have a little more of "the obvious" explained per WP:OBVIOUS. For example, the first line in the main body begins with "According to Bob Ignizio, of Utter Trash..." What is Utter Trash and why does it qualify Ignizio to be commenting on this subject? Because the subject of Utter Trash is not obvious (as opposed to something like, "Jim Mortland, a reviewer for World of Video Games which tells the reader right away what his qualifications are) its relevance to the article needs to be (briefly) explained. It doesn't have to be substantial, no more than a sentence and, preferably, sneaking it in to a pre-existing sentence (although the one in question is long enough as it is, but you know...) For example, earlier in the lead you explained what Wizards of the Coast was. Even though anyone reading an article about a D&D related topic should know who they are, it's still good to state the obvious. I would say that you can get away without explaining what LegionoftheNight.com is, since Vargo's significance has already been asserted by his being a past executive producer for the albums.

    Done I think. Not something I had considered before, but I certainly see how it improves it. J Milburn 22:00, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

3. In the second paragraph you write "Before the band started writing or recording music, they sat down with the Dungeons & Dragons designers, who told them of several elements that were essential on the album. You do an excellent job of approaching this in the article, but do you happen to know what those essential elements were? I feel like that statement just drops suddenly.

    Not done For now. The interview I cited doesn't mention it, I'll have a sniff around. J Milburn 22:00, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

    Done I added what I could find, hope that is enough. J Milburn 21:57, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

   Yup, that's great. Except you started a sentence with "however" though. I fixed it though, haha. Cheers, CP 22:42, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

4. Personal pet peeve: don't begin a sentence with "however." I fixed this myself, but for future reference, Good Articles look better if they don't have sentences that begin with "but," "however," or "and" unless there's an important stylistic reason for it (which, since this is an encyclopedia article and not a creative work, should be exceedingly rare).

   Ok, thanks! J Milburn 22:00, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

5. I think the Musical Style section needs to be expanded, because I'm not really getting a good sense of who and what Midnight Syndicate is and they are, of course, a crucial component othis article. I'm not saying that you should go into a whole history of the band, but the section as it stands is not very large and could to afford to have added to it relevant facts about the band's history and such. Again, not too much information but enough that someone who's never heard of them before (like myself) can get at least the general idea. Right now, I have basic facts like band members and music style, but I can't visualize much about the band. In fact, if you can get an image, preferably a free one, to help illustrate the band, that would help. I realize that this is a bit of an annoying request, since I'm basically telling you to give me information without telling you what information I want, but I have so little of an idea of what Midnight Syndicate is after reading the article that it's hard for me to pick out what exactly I'm looking for. You seem to know about the band though, so pretend you're explaining this album to someone and they ask you who Midnight Syndicate is. What would you tell them? It's helpful to have a centralized description that brings together the scattered facts about the band that are around the article; to have a clear paragraph elucidating the band's most relevant features.

   Right, this will take a little bit, but I can see what you mean. I'll look into it. J Milburn 22:00, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

   I haven't forgotten about this, I'm still looking into it. J Milburn 22:00, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

    Done I think I now give a pretty good image of who the band are, and, combined with the descriptions from the critics I quote below that, give a good idea of what the music sounds like. J Milburn 18:49, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

6. Minor prose complaint, but in the reception section, you use the verb "said" an awful lot. Even alternating between "claimed" and "said" would be better than having back-to-back saids, although a variety of different verbs would be ideal. Also, since you're just paraphrasing Vogal and not quoting him directly, a phrase like "was a plus" strikes me as something that should be rephrased to something more appropriate for an encyclopedia.

    Done J Milburn 22:00, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

7. Under "Personnel," you explained who Vogal was in the previous section, so you don't need to do it again.

    Done J Milburn 22:00, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

8. If there are any other related albums or concepts with Wikipedia pages, you should put them in a See Also section. If there's not though, that's fine too.

   I can't think of anything related not already linked in the article. J Milburn 22:00, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

   Que Sera Sera. Cheers, CP 22:27, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Thus, the verdict for the moment is to put the article on hold for up to seven days, after which point it may be failed without any further notice. Given the work that you've done on it thus far, I think that these concerns are relatively minor and I hope to pass it soon! Cheers, CP 17:40, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

As a neutral editor, I have been told many times that the Lead should not have references, as they are repeated in the article (this includes Featured Article reviews, BTW). --andreasegde 17:49, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Well, per WP:LEAD: Because leads are usually written at a greater level of generality than the body, lead information on non-controversial subjects is less likely to be challenged and less likely to require a source; there is not, however, a citation exception specific to leads. So it is up to one's interpretation I suppose. My question is, what harm does it do to cite in the lead? I could accept hearing that a lead COULD be fine without sources, but SHOULD not have sources is a bit iffy to me. Cheers, CP 18:01, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

I agree with andreasegde- anything in the lead, should, by the very nature of the lead, be mentioned elsewhere in the article, and so that the lead flows a little better, there should be no citations, meaning things should be cited elsewhere in the article. The only things that needed to be cited in leads is negative material in a BLP, or direct quotes, and I don't think either apply here. Or, that is what I have always thought, and what the relevent policy section said until a few days ago, but someone seems to have had a hack at it and added a tag saying that those things are debated. I will have to wade into THAT debate at some point... Anyway, thanks for the review, I will look into your requests. J Milburn 20:55, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Aha, so there's a debate about it then! Well my concern is following the policy, not debating on whether or not it's valid. I've left a quick note here so that other GA reviewers can have their say on the issue as it applies to good articles. I'm not trying to force anyone to reference the lead, by the way, just covering my own ass for when I plan to pass this. ;) Cheers, CP 22:27, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

Apparently, according to the discussion, a GA can have a lead without citations, so please consider my first GA comment stricken. Cheers, CP 01:45, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

Thanks! I'll see what I can do about the other points later this evening. J Milburn 16:29, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

Since the start of the review, in my search for information to address the points above, I have added a few facts and new citations, as well as small prose-tweaks. You may wish to compare the history from when you first arrived to the article now, to see what I have added. J Milburn 21:57, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

Oh, and another thing- any advice on getting this up to featured article would be appreciated. It is longer than, and is about as well referenced as, some other album featured articles. J Milburn 21:59, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

Well I've never done FA reviewing before, but when I read over the article again after you'd addressed my last point, I can go over it and offer any points that I can, although I would suggest you take it someone more experienced. A peer review COULD definitely help, except that I've found the general peer review system to be very useless unless it's a high priority topic. If one of the Wikiprojects has a good reputation for going over peer reviews, you might want to bring it to them specifically. I've had three peer reviews - List of Married... with Children episodes, Wade Mainer and Major League Baseball (video game). Of those, the first was more or less useless, and foolishly led me to believe that it was good enough for FL and the second garnered zero response from WP:BIO despite me having performed a review of someone else's bio. I brought the third to WP:Video Games, however, and got excellent advice and suggestions. So the best advice I can give is look around and see if any of the wikiprojects that this falls under gives particularly good reviews/advice and submit it there. Not only will they have a better understanding of what makes an article of their class good than I would, but they'll likely be able to compare you to other FAs in their class and give you better pointers. Cheers, CP 22:42, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

I already lobbed this peer review's way, but, as you can see at the top of the talk page, I got nothing. WikiProject Metal is excellent for peer reviews, but, sadly, this isn't metal. I could post a request on WikiProject Dungeons & Dragons for advice... I guess dropping LuciferMorgan a line would be a good idea- he has written a lot of featured articles on albums, and reviewed many articles in his time. Anyway, thanks in advance for that, and I will hopefully add the final requested point to this article later tonight. J Milburn 15:50, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

Right, everything look good, just one last little thing. The Gothic horror link in the lead and in musical style leads to a re-direct page that redirects to Gothic fiction. Is this what you intended? If so, you should by pass the redirect in the pipe. I would do it myself, but I wanted to make sure that that was your intention. Otherwise, it looks great and once this little question has been addressed, I will be happy to upgrade it to GA! Cheers, CP 20:04, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, that's what I intended. From what I know about the band, the music is much closer to gothic fiction than, say, gothic rock, and I think that is what Douglas means. The convention is not to 'fix' redirects with pipe links to the target article. Anyway, thanks a lot, you've been a fantastic reviewer, the article has certainly improved with your input. One last thing to ask- I know you said you aren't much experienced with Featured Articles, but you've certainly helped the article so far- how far do you think this is from Featured Article, and what do you think I could do to improve it? J Milburn 20:30, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

Errr... not sure that's what I meant with the redirect thing, but as long as it's pointing to the right place, that's good enough for me. Let me pass the GA article, then think about FA status. Oh, and congratulations! Cheers, CP 20:50, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

Thinking about it, I apologize but I'd really rather offer no advice than bad advice. I saw from above that the peer review didn't help at all, the best thing I can suggest is to look here at the list of FA Class Albums and see what you can take from them. The thing with FAs is that it's very difficult to get something that's not big and out there to FA because there are often too few reviews/third party sources to bring it up to that status. Having said that, it's certainly not impossible, so I say make use of all the resources that you can - look at past reviews for failed and current FAs, look at other FA Albums and, if you can take a bit of a pride hit, perhaps nominate it for an A Class review or even a FA Nomination - it may not pass, but the reviewers are excellent scrutinizers, so you may get some good tips, even if it passes. List of Married... with Children episodes will almost certainly fail, but I will at least get good tips from the reviewers who scrutinize the nomination. Best of luck and Cheers, CP 21:13, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

Inappropriate use of opinion captioning on the track listings themselves?

The use of captionings such as "Compared to the opening of Conan the Barbarian" and "Described as sounding similar to Danny Elfman's music" next to the titles of the tracks themselves is highly irregular for a wikipedia music article and jars significantly with the standard expected for such an article. Perhaps these "observances" should be taken to a separate section before the track listing (properly cited, of course), allowing those who are interested in such information to find information in one way, and those interesting in solely the track listing to find information in the track listing, as expected?

It sounds needlessly pedantic, but thinking about it, including information about the tracks within the names of the tracks themselves is entirely inappropriate and not an efficient use of space in any way. It's confusing, allows the fan to rule over the artist (through exposing the influences of music at exactly the same level as the music itself), and not in any way part of a NPOV by putting one interpretation of the music above all others.

I won't change anything without response regarding this (I lack the technical know-how to do so in any case) as there could be a perfectly reasonable answer for this. As it stands, though, this section appears to be highly subjective, running against the prevailing structural standards of wikipedia, and entirely contrary to the purpose of the site. Any thoughts? 86.16.152.103 (talk) 01:33, 6 January 2009 (UTC)

The notes are all attributed to the appropriate reviewer, and I believe that notes about the individual songs are relevant. They wouldn't really fit in anywhere else- where better to make notes about individual songs than with the songs themselves? When I originally placed it in the article, I used a table where the notes were not formatted in the same way. I personally thought that method a little better, but it was standardised. I would have no opposition to moving back to the original formatting. J Milburn (talk) 16:37, 6 January 2009 (UTC)

I know this is an eleven year old conversation, and I don't know if anyone else is watching this, but I absolutely must agree with the IP. These critical commentaries belong in a reception section, but the track listing. oknazevad (talk) 14:50, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

J Milburn was the one who busted out all the hard work on this article back in the day, so hopefully he would be willing to take another look at your concerns. :) BOZ (talk) 17:02, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

@Oknazevad and BOZ: Thanks for the comments. This was written in the wild west days of Wikipedia; it's no wonder some things don't hold up today! I was heartened that people were happy with the article when it ran on the main page. I've integrated the comments elsewhere, as recommended. Josh Milburn (talk) 21:16, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

Looks good! oknazevad (talk) 21:49, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

Good deal. :) BOZ (talk) 22:48, 28 January 2020 (UTC)

Dragonlance: Dragons of Autumn Twilight

I'd like to call for the sentence 'It is reputedly the only official Dungeons & Dragons soundtrack.' to be removed from the article. Even if it isn't accepted that the other claim of a previous 'official D&D soundtrack' existed, there is another CD called Dragonlance: Dragons of Autumn Twilight.

Dragonlance is a Dungeons and Dragons campaign setting, so the soundtrack of the Dragonlance: Dragons of Autumn Twilight movie is just as 'official' as this one, and that makes the claim that this CD is the only 'official' one seem to be an inaccurate statement.

I think it would be better to drop all references to claims like that and concentrate on the article being about the music and the project behind it. I think that we also need a Dragonlance: Dragons of Autumn Twilight (album) article and maybe a category for D&D music articles to go into. Big Mac (talk) 02:25, 14 April 2012 (UTC)

That would be the soundtrack to a film, rather than specifically to the game. I don't really like the idea of claiming that both the primary and the secondary sources are wrong; that feels a little too much like original research. A note about that music, however, may be in order. J Milburn (talk) 11:30, 14 April 2012 (UTC)

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Today's Featured Article

Wow, a decade between achieving FA status and becoming "Today's Featured Article". It's got to be some sort of record. But congratulations to the editors. Praemonitus (talk) 14:17, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

I think J Milburn was the main person involved! BOZ (talk) 14:32, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

Thanks! This was my first featured article; I confess that it's probably up to the standards expected at FAC in 2018, but I think it holds up fairly well. Josh Milburn (talk) 16:29, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

Sourcing comments

There's an ongoing FA sweeps focused on the older ones to make sure everything is up to current standards. I'm not entirely familiar with D&D related sources, but I'm really unsure that some of these sources meet the "high-quality reliable sources" part of WP:FACR. Sources such as Legion of the Night, The Acaeum, Gamingreport.com, Living Dead Girls, Middle Pillar, Darker than the Bat, and Skirmisher Game Store would likely be challenged at a FAC today. Most of the rest of the sources are primary. Hog Farm _Talk 20:38, 28 March 2021 (UTC)

User:J Milburn, do you have any insight on these? BOZ (talk) 23:08, 28 March 2021 (UTC)

Legion of the Night is also primary. GamingReport is borderline. Living Dead Girls, Legion of the Bat, and Middle Pillar are the sort of alternative music ezines that there were loads of at the time -- some would pass as reliable, some not. I don't know how reliable The Acaeum would be, but at least one of the sources to it is to a scan of something that is reliable (but primary). Skirmisher Game Store could go. Josh Milburn (talk) 07:43, 29 March 2021 (UTC)

@Hog Farm, J Milburn, and BOZ: I am following up on the above conversation, and it seems the sources mentioned above are still in the article. Are you willing to fix up this article, or would one of you be interested in bringing this to WP:FAR? Hog Farm and I have 5 articles at FAR right now, we would not be able to nominate this for a couple of weeks. Z1720 (talk) 20:02, 6 February 2022 (UTC)