Boston Globe's Scores

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For 2,093 reviews, this publication has graded:
  • 66% higher than the average critic
  • 3% same as the average critic
  • 31% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 0.6 points lower than other critics. (0-100 point scale)
Average Music review score: 72
Highest review score: 100 City of Refuge
Lowest review score: 10 Lulu
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 1,670 out of 2093
  2. Mixed: 412 out of 2093
  3. Negative: 11 out of 2093
2093 music reviews
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    • 84 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga
    From the terrific pulsing opener, "Don't Make Me a Target," to the curt horn and acoustic-guitar stomp of "The Underdog," these wonderfully produced and arranged songs brim with optimism and are pounded out purposefully.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Cross
    Layers of production can obscure the organic--or at least faux-organic--sounds of a ripping performance. That's not the case on the debut full-length album from French house duo Justice, whose complex, dark, and heavily pop-rock-influenced dance tracks span banging disco grooves to instrumental electro-funk space operas to minimalist hip-hop.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Marry Me
    Though her versatility is promising, Clark will be able to compete only when she figures out how to be one very interesting person, instead of five caricatures at once.
    • 70 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Ms. Kelly
    Rowland offers a solid if somewhat safe set of grooves, but the album never takes full flight to become something special.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Easy Tiger
    Gone is the petulant enfant terrible, and with it a certain sparkle and swagger that made a record like "Gold" careen from the speakers.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Build A Nation
    The music? Thrilling as ever.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    At My Age
    The album traverses Ray Charles-like country soul, smoky late-night jazz, lush Western swing, and even a bit of Rockpile-style rockabilly.
    • 50 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Theology
    The acoustic half... overshoots mere serenity and lands in a much sleepier place.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    My December
    "My December" offers an appealing if uneven snapshot of a girl with a big voice and big emotions who's in transition.
    • 68 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    The Fragile Army
    The new songs are much darker.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Icky Thump
    It's fantastic.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Lost Highway
    The band does little more than take the easiest trappings of country and plug them in.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    In Camera
    The Seattle boy-girl duo of Grant Olsen and Sonya Westcott fashions narcotic, melancholy pop songs that would make the band's influences proud (Neil Young and the Velvet Underground in its quieter moments chief among them).
    • 75 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Era Vulgaris
    Somehow, it all works together, from the psychedelic guitar warble to the bits of prog to the almost country-style harmonies.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Memory Almost Full
    This collection is filled with half-baked ideas and shallow reminiscences, a pair of dated rockers, and one meditation on mortality that manages to be maudlin and bubble-headed at the same time. It smacks of Wings at its goofiest.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Eat Me, Drink Me
    It's not his best effort, but it's the perfect mood setter for your midnight absinthe and auto-erotic asphyxiation party.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Good Girl Gone Bad
    What the songs lack in lyrical innovation they more than make up for in transporting rhythms.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Sweet Warrior
    With nothing particularly unusual to recommend, non-fans will miss out on yet another in a long string of superb collections.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    The Sun And The Moon
    This easily ranks among the top rock records of the year.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    It Won't Be Soon Before Long
    The tunes... are uniformly strong, and the playing and production neatly manicured, if a bit dense in places. But the lyrics are spotty at best.
    • 70 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Light At The End Of The World
    A batch of keyboard-driven dance tunes that could easily have been recorded in the early 1990s -- and for fans, that's good news.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Release The Stars
    It's an ornate, dizzying affair, where all his interests and talents collide in one brazen gesture. It's impressive in scope, but where does that leave the listener? Possibly with a headache.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Sky Blue Sky
    Wilco hasn't forsaken its experimental streak, and the group uses it in the service of darkness -- or rather the threat of darkness.
    • 56 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Minutes To Midnight
    We've heard a lot of this despair before.
    • 68 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    One Of The Boys
    A pleasant-enough escapist soundtrack for the summer.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Volta
    "Volta," much like "Medulla," is an appealing series of collaborations and musical ideas that do not quite jell in their final, recorded versions.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Everybody
    They take prime garage rock and global beats from past works and flirtatiously commingle them to craft a gossamer rock - steady creation.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    New Moon
    Far from a compilation of rough mixes and rejects, any of the songs on this disc -- as spare in sound as they are elegant in form -- would have fit beautifully on a mid-'90s Elliott Smith album.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Human The Death Dance
    He's still one of the most enjoyable lyricists in hip-hop, and he successfully communicates what he's feeling in a dark and enlightening fashion.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Strength & Loyalty
    Together, they have their tricky, intricate flow intact, and the songs are supremely melodic, sharply arranged to remind you of how tuneful and infectious hip-hop can be.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    The Magic Position
    Rarely has spilling one's heart been such a colorful affair.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    American Doll Posse
    Grand conceit aside, "American Doll Posse" is a great art-pop album.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Beyond
    Amazingly, "Beyond" picks up where 1988's "Bug" left off, with only slightly more streamlined polish but with the old love of volume and excess still sweetly intact.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    The Reminder
    "The Reminder" features Feist free from the polished confines of her previous effort. Instead, she opts for a more organic approach punctuated by subtle electronic elements, soulful vocal harmonies, and glam-rock guitar riffs.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Because Of You
    A sexy and sweet sophomore release that’s got more love flowing from it than an ‘‘Oprah’’ audience on ‘‘My Favorite Things’’ day.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Snakes & Arrows
    "Snakes & Arrows" is several steps ahead of more recent efforts.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    5:55
    These gauzy songs are an ideal fit for Gainsbourg's dreamy, impossibly light voice.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Twelve
    Captivating.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Favourite Worst Nightmare
    Forget about the dreaded decline. Arctic Monkeys have moved from their alarmingly evolved infancy into rock toddlerhood with glibness, swagger, and whip-smart songs intact.
    • 60 Metascore
    • 30 Critic Score
    Dumb Luck
    Everyone seems tired on this album: The songs meander, and the guest singers (including Conor Oberst) speak or moan lyrics they don't seem to care about.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    We'll Never Turn Back
    [It] seems like the album the 66-year-old singer was born to make
    • 66 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    The Best Damn Thing
    The songs are furiously bouncy and unbelievably vapid.
    • 59 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Let's Just Be
    A wildly uneven record.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Year Zero
    It's classic Nine Inch Nails with a few extra-disturbing flourishes.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Cassadaga
    "Cassadaga"... delivers on the wildly unlikely promise that very young, very gifted artists can grow up without losing their balance.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    23
    "23" furthers the group's recent fascination with a sleeker presentation that favors sheen over squall.
    • 60 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    The Adventures Of Ghosthorse And Stillborn
    The production is cleaner this time around, a mixed blessing that steals some of the band's messy, homemade charm in favor of a richer, atmospheric effect.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    The Undisputed Truth
    It furthers his reputation as a boldly honest wordsmith dealing with personal conflicts while examining the hypocrisy and contradictions of American culture.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Jarvis
    A collection of songs that proves nearly as personal, as socially aware, and as deft at intertwining the two, as was Pulp’s 1998 opus, ‘‘This Is Hardcore.’’
    • 68 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Traffic And Weather
    If ‘‘Traffic and Weather,’’ doesn’t as frequently pack the knock-out punch of 2003’s superb ‘‘Welcome Interstate Managers,’’ it still more than holds its own in the fight for pop music that is both catchy and canny.
    • 54 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Timbaland Presents Shock Value
    Solid if unspectacular.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Big
    The lyrics -- which seesaw manically between exhortations to a no-goodnik to get out and purrings about being glad to have a lover by her side -- won't get nominated for any poetry awards, but Gray makes her case on the strength of her nutty soul charms.
    • 45 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Como Ama Una Mujer
    A sincere album, organic in its instrumentation and introspective in its lyrics.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Let It Go
    The darkest record that McGraw has ever made.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Music Is My Savior
    [A] fluid, likable disc.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    We Were Dead Before The Ship Even Sank
    If "We Were Dead . . ." is a little much to take in all at once, the sheer mass of the tunes becomes easier to manage over repeated listens.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Drums And Guns
    Magnificent.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Living With The Living
    Leo manages to skip from tender, unadorned romantic pop crooning to full-throttle punk yowling to Celtic-flavored folk-rock without losing the listener, the beat, or the message.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Armchair Apocrypha
    The strength of this album lies in Bird's ability to write challenging, evocative lyrics, and then wed his erudite prose with joyous melodies.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    I'll Sleep When You're Dead
    "I'll Sleep" isn't supposed to be easy listening, but it shouldn't be this hard, either.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Out Of The Woods
    Too many bleak ballads about lost love and runaways bring down the fun.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Pocket Symphony
    Where "Pocket Symphony" springs to life are tracks when Nicolas Godin and J.B. Dunckel dabble with 1960s-influenced folk-pop.
    • 87 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Neon Bible
    Not quite of this world and not quite over the edge, these earthy, epic songs aren't meant to save us, only to supply some monumental crescendos and a wide-screen view on the way down.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    The Search
    A collection of highly listenable roots-rock tunes that stray little from its longtime formula.
    • 44 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    The Weirdness
    "The Weirdness" is raw, but where's the power?
    • 76 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    My Name Is Buddy
    The music can be enjoyed apart from the story, but either way, this is a must-have for true Cooder fans.
    • 60 Metascore
    • 30 Critic Score
    The Third Hand
    For someone who has dazzled with his sonic imagination in the past, Rjd2 sounds very tentative here.
    • 75 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Security
    The album's lengthy tracks are daunting for the casual listener, but the CD casts a spell reminiscent in its raw power and political fervor of TV on the Radio's triumphant "Return to Cookie Mountain."
    • 77 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    The Calling
    Only a singer-songwriter with the force and clarity of Mary Chapin Carpenter could make nihilism sound so cheery.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Back Numbers
    The album casts the duo in a new light that may not quite eclipse their former work, but it has set them well on their way.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    All Of A Sudden I Miss Everyone
    Call it emo for adults.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    The Cost
    The album is sophisticated and layered with deft orchestration. And yet, the band's songwriting and delivery display an earnestness and lack of pretension that's pure rock.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Ash Wednesday
    The touchstones (Cohen, Dylan, Morrison, Yorke, Brion, "Hunky Dory"-era Bowie) are obvious as the album progresses, too obvious at times, but Perkins has his own stories to tell, and he often does so in a mesmerizing fashion.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    In Advance Of The Broken Arm
    Ultimately, "Broken Arm" is more about indulging a massively skewed sonic perspective than a collection of songs.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    West
    Fortunately, the alt-country singer-songwriter’s gifts of soul mining are so acute that the songs — inspired by her mother’s passing and a wrenching breakup — enrich as well as exhaust, and engender cautious optimism.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Vieux Farka Toure
    He enjoys modern arrangements and judicious cross-genre excursions that edge up on reggae and rock, and when he lets go, his guitar lines possess the playful muscularity of a tussle among rambunctious friends.
    • 75 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Phantom Punch
    Unlike previous efforts at stylistic hop-scotch, "Phantom Punch" is Lerche's most comfortable album since "Faces Down."
    • 74 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Loney, Noir
    Twee or not, there is a brilliant simplicity to Svanangen's music, though the tunes are never sparse.
    • 75 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Infinity On High
    Anthems are plenty on "Infinity on High," and odds are good the fans are so well versed in bassist/lyricist Pete Wentz's pun-saturated, self-referential verbiage that they'll simply surrender -- as they should -- to the familiar burly riffs and candied hooks.
    • 87 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Children Running Through
    Suffice to say that if you have enjoyed Griffin's repertoire of considered and emotionally precise songs -- as fans from the Dixie Chicks to Solomon Burke to Jessica Simpson have -- you will find your life enriched by "Children Running Through."
    • 75 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    The Sermon On Exposition Boulevard
    The overall hush of "Sermon" occasionally leads down some sleepy roads. But with a real sense of creative spark at its heart, "Sermon" is a worthy entry into the Book of Rickie Lee.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    There's No 666 In Outer Space
    This is a challenging album that Frank Zappa, Rush, Miles Davis, or Slayer could each call their own.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Friend And Foe
    It sounds like a campfire sing-along at the most evil band camp in the underworld.
    • 75 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Ce
    Veloso's voice and songs are newly elastic, inspired by the economy and daring of the trio of electric guitar, bass, and drums that accompanies his acoustic pluck.
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