1 - 5 Thumbs Up: Don't waste your time or money. 6 Thumbs Up: Despite having one or two redeeming qualities, this album is overall mediocre and non-essential. 7 Thumbs Up: Slightly worse than I expected, but still has a handful of stand-out tracks and a reasonable amount of replay value. 8 Thumbs Up: A quality album. Several stand-out tracks, very consistent, fairly original, and a great amount of replay value. (Due to the cost of CDs, I usually only buy one if I have some idea that it will be good. As a result, most scores default to 8.) 9 Thumbs Up: Better than the average album. Breaks out of a genre's "mould," very little filler, gobs of replay value, and consistently good tracks. 10 Thumbs Up: Groundbreakingly original. No filler, endless replay value, and excellent track selection. Essential.