1) You like just about every song on the album, but you don’t think there are any standout tracks
Comes A Time by Neil Young is probably the best fit for this in my collection. I’ll happily listen to any of the songs on this album, but it doesn’t contain any of my favourite songs by him. My favourite songs would be Goin’ Back and title track, but although I like them a lot, they wouldn’t be in my top 20 Neil songs.
2) You love almost every song on the album, but there is one song you don’t like
Making Movies by Dire Straits is the obvious one for me. The album is superb overall, but I really don’t like the closing track Les Boys. I actually left it off my iPod as the other six tracks are great and the album feels better and more cohesive without it.
To a lesser extent, I would also say Led Zeppelin III, where I really like every song except for Hats Off To (Roy) Harper, which I don’t care much for. Unlike Les Boys example, I do find Harper listenable, but I wish they’d included the superior Hey Hey What Can I Do instead.
3) You much prefer the first half of the album to the second half
Pink Floyd’s More Soundtrack album – most of side one is decent, and it has a couple of pretty good songs (Cirrus Minor and Cymbaline). Side two, however, mostly consists of unmemorable instrumentals and is far weaker than the first half, let alone peak Pink Floyd.
I’d also suggest Coda by Led Zeppelin, where side one has some good material (We’re Gonna Groove rocks) but I can take or leave virtually everything on side two.
4) You much prefer the second half of the album to the first half
I might be in a minority here, but I much prefer the second half of Brothers In Arms by Dire Straits. With the exception of Money For Nothing, I don’t rate the other hits on the first half that highly, whereas I love the war/conflict-themed songs on side two, especially the title track.
I’d also say Neil Young’s American Stars n Bars, where I like the country songs on side one but I don’t consider any of them to be classic Neil, whereas side two boasts Like A Hurricane, which I think just might be his single greatest song, and I also find the other material more interesting than side one.
5) You think the album starts and ends weakly, but is strong in the middle
Pink Floyd’s Obscured By Clouds – I don’t care for the closing instrumental, and although I like the opening two tracks a bit better I can live without them. By contrast, the songs in the middle of the album from Burning Bridges to Stay (tracks 3-9) are generally very good.
6) You like about half of the album and dislike about half of it – you generally either really like or don’t like most songs, with few tracks falling between the two extremes
The album that epitomises this for me is Building The Perfect Beast (sorry Don!). On one hand, Boys of Summer is a classic, I love Month Of Sundays and I also like You’re Not Drinking Enough, Not Enough Love In The World and Sunset Grill. Unfortunately, I don’t care for Land of the Living and there’s three tracks I really don’t like (Man On A Mission, the title track and Driving With Your Eyes Closed). I can never quite decide whether I like All She Wants To Do Is Dance or not. The only ‘meh’ track for me is You Can’t Make Love.