Meghan&Dani's Hairy Bootlegs

About our Ratings

Our ratings aren't scientific. In fact, they are completely a matter of our opinion, which is likely to vary slightly on any given day. You know, one day I might listen to a boot and not even be bothered by a slight tape hiss... and the next day I put it in the player and have to stop playback because the hiss is too annoying. What I'm saying is that our ratings are likely to have a bit of "mood factor" built in that's going to vary depending on the day that I actually sit down to apply a rating to the particular boot. We decided to go with the normal old A-F grading scale - and left room for +'s and -'s. I promise to try to keep "mood factor" to a minimum, but hey - I'm human.

So, here's what you need to know regarding our ratings.

A
This is the quality of boot that we are looking for when we trade. An example of an A+ recording is soundboard, FM or studio recording. A decent, clear, good sounding boot without any minor gliches would be an A. Really minor gliches, sound problems, crowd annoyances, etc would make it an A-. In short, any form of A we think is worthy of a trade.

B
Totally respectable boot. A few more gliches or recording / editing errors. Maybe a bit more crowd noise, distant or fuzzy sound, rude audience. Probably a digital recording made with lower quality mics. Could be a really stellar analog recording.

C
An OK boot. Not the best, some fairly serious issues. These are the ones that we might not ever listen to unless the performance was completely amazing (and we can't find a better recording of the show). Basically, these shows have too much tape hiss, unclear sound, crowd noise, or recorder errors that make it difficult to listen to. A C+ quality boot might be worth trading for if it contained a song that is rarely played live or there is something else unique about it.

D
These boots are not worth having unless you are looking to have a complete collection of available shows or something. If we have these in our collection it's probably because we forgot to ask about quality and ended up with bad recordings. These are shows that you can barely hear the performers through the crowd noise, muffled sound, distortion, etc and were made using crappy equipment (i.e. a $40 tape recorder with a built in mic that you picked up from Walmart right before the show and recorded onto a Walmart brand cassette that cost you $5 for a pack of 10). These boots simply are not worth the postage with which they were mailed.

F
I hope that we don't have any of these in our collection. And, if we do, we probably won't list them -- or will remove them once we're aware that they suck so badly.