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Zero 7
Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed albums.
Lullabies To Paralyze
EMAILPRINTby Queens Of The Stone Age
Generally favorable reviews
Based on 31 critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
Based on 75 votes
Read user comments
Rate this album >
Album Info
Label: Interscope
Release Date: 22 March 2005
Discs: 1 disc
Genre(s): Alternative, Rock
Summary
Only Josh Homme remains from the QOTSA's previous LP, and he's now joined by guitarist Troy Van Leeuwen (A Perfect Circle) and drummer Joey Castillo (Danzig). The band's fourth album also includes appearances by Brody Dalle, Shirley Manson and ZZ Top's Billy Gibbons.
Also By This Artist: Era Vulgaris Songs For The Deaf
Also On Metacritic
MUSIC: Eagles Of Death Metal: Peace Love Death Metal
Also On The Web: Official Artist Site
What The Critics Said
All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...
Alternative Press
The Queens have officially given us the first legitimate Album Of The Year candidate for 2005. [May 2005, p.130]
Los Angeles Times
This is metal that swings, heavy with a deft touch. [24 Apr 2005]
All Music Guide
They are so good, so natural on Lullabies to Paralyze that it's easy to forget that they just lost Oliveri, but that just makes Homme's triumph here all the more remarkable.
Read Full Review >Filter
Taken on its own, any one of these songs is pretty good--and some are really good--but Lullabies to Paralyze is held prostrate by an overall lack of variety not made up for by kitsch or vigor. [#14, p.94]
E! Online
Lullabies to Paralyze explodes with tight, meaty riffs, enormous pop melodies and vocals that seem to come from outer space.
Read Full Review >Village Voice
They still cuss (in case you for-fucking-got), and they still gab about drinking and screwing and dabbing their noses in the c-c-c-c-c-cocaine, so all's good in that regard.
Read Full Review >Billboard
The 2005 version of QOTSA finds the band more relaxed and loose than it has ever been on record.
Read Full Review >Playlouder
What's great about this album is they've managed to wield the same monolithic power riffs but make them count, with melodies and ideas way more consistent than before.
Read Full Review >Uncut
Effectively embracing the entire history of the band's sound, the album sprawls over an hour, and has so many peaks and valleys it's practically topographical. [Apr 2005, p.98]
New Musical Express
Where 'Songs For The Deaf' was about jumping up and down until your eardrums burst, 'Lullabies To Paralyze' will use its enigmatic mysticism to lull you into a blissful daze so you don't at first notice that the riffs have broken your neck. [12 Mar 2005, p.55]
Mojo
This is not a Big Rock Record. Instead it's intimate, multi-layered and uplifting. [Apr 2005, p.86]
Q Magazine
Precise, tough, tuneful, ambitious and sexy as hell. [Apr 2005, p.112]
Under The Radar
At times, the songs get bogged down in too much heavy instrumentation, but they are always saved by [Homme's] soothing, drawling vocals. [#9]
ShakingThrough.net
It's the magnetic push and pull of its different sonic layers and shifting moods that really defines the record (for better and worse), and rewards repeated listens.
Read Full Review >Tiny Mix Tapes
Lullabies is one of the strongest albums of 2005 thus far, from beginning to end.
Read Full Review >Spin
An eclectic, rippin' record whose only shortcoming is its commitment to artistic quality. [Apr 2005, p.99]
Entertainment Weekly
The macho posturing can get obnoxious.... That said, anyone looking for a band that can mix and match metal, blues, thrash, punk, psychedelia, and grunge as the mood suits will be floored by Lullabies. [25 Mar 2005, p.70]
Pitchfork
Lullabies occasionally evokes early Black Sabbath and nods to a few psych-rock stalwarts but, like most Queens' records, it's oddly unclassifiable. It's also troublingly inconsistent.
Read Full Review >cokemachineglow
Lullabies to Paralyze loses points for a handful of uninspired tracks and questionable production values, but I can’t imagine anybody who’s enjoyed the Queens in the past not taking to at least half of the songs on this album.
Read Full Review >Lost At Sea
Where Songs for the Deaf found the perfect middle ground between aggressive rocking licks and experimental flourishes, Lullabies falls to the experimental side.
Read Full Review >Dot Music
For the most part, "Lullabies To Paralyze" keeps up the high musical standard set by its predecessors.
Read Full Review >The Onion (A.V. Club)
Without other strong personalities in the band to rein him in, Homme's occasional excesses undercuts what makes QOTSA so great.
Read Full Review >Magnet
It's an overstuffed, uneven album, one that's not disappointing as much as it is disorienting. [#67, p.111]
Rolling Stone
It's the tension between Homme's conflicting impulses that pressurizes Lullabies to Paralyze's highest points and accounts for its lows.
Read Full Review >Blender
Sounds routine, obscure without much mystery. [Apr 2005, p.124]
PopMatters
Even if the characteristic humor is gone, the album hits more than it misses -- but it's fairly bottom-heavy, leaving much stoner drone in the way of the eventual goods.
Read Full Review >Drowned In Sound
‘Songs For The Deaf’ worked because it had the tunes to handle the drama. It dared you to hate it at first so that it could eventually win you over, which made its triumph all the greater. But with ‘Lullabies To Paralyze’ you’re waiting a long time to be won over, and when it finally happens, it’s far too brief.
Read Full Review >Prefix Magazine
Lullabies is ultimately a demanding, schizophrenic, lopsided album. At its best, it's an elaboration on what Queens have become known for -- distinct, droning, melodic, heavy guitar rock. At its worst it's futile, go-nowhere studio sludge.
Read Full Review >Trouser Press
Even through patches of mediocrity, QOTSA still offer something healthy and respectable to the hard rock world, but too much of anything can be bad for you.
Read Full Review >What Our Users Said
The average user rating for this album is 8.7 (out of 10) based on 75 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.
Mark K. gave it a9:
These lullabies indeed paralyze with pure brilliance.
Dimitri V. gave it a7:
This album is quite different. Whereas QOTSA had groovy rocksongs all along, its as they (Josh Homme) decided to make more "rythmical" music. So this is a sometimes very basic and repetitive album. It contains some good songs but it took me a while to get "in" the album. And i started listening to it again to make my final opinion and there are just some songs that aren't quite good enough and the other songs, some pretty decent, just don't stick in the head despite how much i listen to it. I sometimes catch myself thinking about pushing the NEXT button to skip some songs. I still do give it a 7 because, like i mentioned earlier, it does contain some pretty good songs but all in all, i expected better.
Vlada J gave it a10:
for me this is best album ever,best album of 2007, although i spent lot of time listening to it end i'm finding that this album can't be likeable at first,and you realy must like QOTSA...so if someone say that he realy listens them and say that he don't like that album,then i can understand... QOTSA FAN
Win E gave it a5:
I'm a big fan and for 2 years I've been trying to get into this album. Sadly, it's never gonna 'click'. It's a struggle. There are some real great tracks, but too much of it is nowhere near what'[s expected of Homme & Co. A really tough record to get into and the good songs against the bad don't make listening very rewarding.
Rosscoe P gave it a10:
when i first got this album, to tell the truth, i was alittle upset, becasue it hought this was songs for the deaf, but after listening to it, i must say, i think this is their best album
jen gave it a10:
this is one of the greatest albums of my time if you are in any doubt buy it put it in the cd player of your car head out to the country with a pack of marlboros and a few friends and go for it. thats what this album is all about
Nick L gave it a10:
A great, haunting album that isn't for everyone but if you are into the style you will love it.
