The Fall Cup: Stage 1 Stats

 


Before we embark upon Stage 2, here are a few statistics from the first stage of the competition...

Highest point totals:

  • 58: Blindness
  • 56: The Classical / Weather Report 2 / Smile / Fantastic Life
  • 54: Winter / Gross Chapel – British Grenadiers
  • 53: Mister Rode
  • 52: New Puritan / Leave the Capitol / Dr. Bucks’ Letter
  • 50: Bury! / 4½ Inch / Fortress-Deer Park


Biggest winning margins:
  • 20 Fantastic Life
  • 18 Dr. Bucks’ Letter
  • 16 Blindness
  • 14 Weather Report 2 / Gross Chapel – British Grenadiers
  • 13 Leave the Capitol / Smile
  • 10 Winter / Mister Rode / I Am Damo Suzuki
Only just missed out:

Went out on a tie-break: 
  • Mother-Sister!
Finished 1 point behind 6th place:
  • Blood Outta Stone
  • Bourgeois Town
  • One Day
  • Serum
  • Birthday Song
Finished 2 points behind 6th place:
  • Early Days of Channel Fuhrer
  • Futures and Pasts
  • 986 Generator
  • Taurig
  • Shift-work
  • Room To Live
There were 33 songs that failed to get any points - list here


Songs that qualified despite getting a zero from two of the panel:

Third place:
  • Jam Song (Eric, Richard)
Sixth place:
  • O.F.Y.C. Showcase (bzfgt, Richard)
  • Carry Bag Man (Steve, bzfgt)
  • No Respects/No Respects Rev. (Eric, Richard)
  • Telephone Thing (Steve, Eric)
  • Two Steps Back (bzfgt, Lewis)
  • Higgle-Dy Piggle-Dy (Eric, bzfgt)

Proportion of each album* to qualify:


*And yes, I have included Slates - The Remainderer as well, just like I did in the book. Sue me.


The Panel

There was some discussion amongst the panel (and on the FOF) about which of the panel made the most eccentric / outlying choices. Eric, for example, said:

I have not thought of my Fall tastes as being particularly off from the conventional wisdom, such as it is. So I have been really surprised by the number of things I thought would be walkthroughs, that were not.

There were also several comments like this one from Lewis:

My fellow contributors seem to have been more cloth-eared than ever before this week.

So let's have a look at what the statistics tell us...





I also looked at the average score that each panelist awarded to the 6 tracks that went through in each round. If your top 6 (i.e. your 12/10/8/7/6/5 point songs) all qualified, the your average would be 8.

The rounds that had the greatest level of consensus:

Round 15 (Average = 7.6)
'Marquis Cha Cha' went out despite getting a 7 from Richard and Eric; Richard gave the only zero to a qualifier ('Second House Now'). Apart from that, everyone was pretty much in agreement.

Round 28 (Average = 7.4)
Lewis didn't give 6th place 'Midnight In Aspen' any points, and there were a couple of 7s that didn't go through (Eric with 'Reprise'; Lewis with 'Kimble') but otherwise we were all on the same page.

The rounds that had the least consensus:

Round 13 (Average = 6.37)
'Carry Bag Man' went through despite zeroes from both bzfgt and me. Qualifiers 'Disney’s Dream Debased' and 'Cruiser's Creek' got nothing from Eric and Richard respectively. There were 8 marks of 6 or better amongst those who didn't go through.

Round 8 (Average = 6.43)
Half of the qualifiers got a zero from one of the panel: 'Over! Over!' (Richard), 'Coach and Horses' and 'Industrial Estate' (both Lewis). Once again, there were 8 marks of 6 or better amongst those who didn't qualify. 



The lowest 'consensus' score was Eric's 3.83 in round 2, when his 12, 10, 6, and 5 votes all failed to progress. He also got a 4.33 in round 19 when his two most highly -rated songs ('Squid Lord' and 'Open the Boxoctosis #2') finished in equal 9th place. Richard claimed the bronze medal in the 'out of kilter with everyone else' stakes in round 26 with a score of 4.5, his support for 'It’s a Curse', 'Edinburgh Man' and 'Australians in Europe' being at odds with everyone else.

















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