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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    • 83 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Real Animal
    Taken as a whole, Real Animal shows a man content with the life he has lived, even as the rest of us hope that his final statement is still some ways off.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Death of a Bachelor
    Bachelor doesn’t always hit.... But Urie’s charm and willingness to maximize his songs’ pop-spectacle quotient make Bachelor an often-delightful accompaniment to 2016’s earliest, chilliest weeks.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Poseidon And The Bitter Bug
    Poseidon follows the pretty but predictable model that has worked for the Indigo Girls for 20 years, and outdoor pavilion crowds everywhere will no doubt be thrilled with the result.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Away from the World
    Though Matthews occasionally splashes around in shallow lyrics, the band overall cooks, fleshing out these tunes in an integral way.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Tin Star
    They aren’t bad songs, but Tin Star is more interesting when Ortega turns her lyrical glance elsewhere.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Junk
    The result is less serious than his last release--the kind of thing we might hear back from aliens in response to radio waves that escaped our stratosphere long ago.
    • 59 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Love to Love You Donna
    While nothing here bests the original tracks--and it is strictly for Summer diehards and remix fans--it’s heartening that artists are still drawing inspiration from a woman who loved it when the music moved people.
    • 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.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Cee Lo's Magic Moment
    Magic Moment easily meets the primary requirement of any Christmas album, which is that it's a worthwhile addition to his fans' collections.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Heart On
    The songs themselves live in the present--and live all over the place.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Doo-Wops and Hooligans
    While promising, though, the disc reveals little about Mars - other than that he clearly has his eyes on the charts.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Wait For Me
    This is all about mood and texture - some of it is beautiful, some of it is noodling. Moby is smart enough to leave most of the singing to others, but the soundscapes and melodies are commanding enough by themselves.
    • 68 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Mind Chaos
    Derivative? Maybe, but at least it’s deftly derived and delivered with purpose and spunk.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Second Chance
    Like a lot of current R&B, there is a sense of anonymity in some of the tracks. Any one of the above singers [James "Jimmy Jam" Harris, Terry Lewis, and Kenny "Babyface" Edmonds] could be subbed in to achieve the same result. But given his place as a forebear, DeBarge definitely deserves these redemption songs.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Quiet Nights
    The line between dreamy and sleepy is a fine one, and many jazz singers have fallen on the wrong side of it when attempting bossa nova. Diana Krall, however, negotiates it skillfully on Quiet Nights, her first album of all bossas.
    • 71 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    One Second of Love
    For a record of such minimalist production as this, the latest from LA's Ramona Gonzalez, a.k.a. Nite Jewel, it's surprising how much genre ground can be covered.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    This One's for Him: A Tribute to Guy Clark
    [A] thoughtful new tribute to the Texas troubadour who, outside of Americana circles, isn't nearly as renowned as he deserves to be.
    • 60 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    I Can Spin a Rainbow
    I Can Spin a Rainbow finds her bouncing ideas off of the Legendary Pink Dots’ Edward Ka-Spel, whose aggressively experimental approach to what a song can entail is so specific and unyielding that the album forces her into new modes.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Wrecking Ball
    While accordions, fiddles, acoustic guitars, and human voices are prominent--befitting the songs' back porch country, folk, and blues vibe--canned clap tracks, woozy keyboards, and whirring sound effects sometimes sit uncomfortably alongside them.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Push Any Button
    She jumps around genres like a Bowie-esque chameleon, but this new effort is a staunch improvement from some of her musical wanderlust.
    • 51 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Clear as Day
    McCreery has plenty of deepening left to do as a performer, but he's off to a good start with this 12-track set about girls, God, family, and small-town life.
    • 75 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    OnMyRadio
    With his fifth album, he pretty much follows his Philly soul formula (even though he now lives in Atlanta), gliding his lithe vocals over keys and an acoustic instrumental dynamic that allow him to shine.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Where Does This Door Go
    Despite dipping into hip-hop and reggae, there are footnotes to ’70s pop throughout. That doesn’t diminish the sheer pleasure of the tunes’ playful intentions, but Hawthorne’s DJ crate-digging tendencies seem to be bleeding into his songwriting.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Let It Burn
    The church is never far from Foster's vocals, and even though the predominant sound here is a blues shot through with organ and echoing slide guitar, she seems closer to gospel than ever.
    • 70 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Food & Liquor, Vol. 2: the Great American Rap Album, Pt. 1
    A challenging set that refuses to settle for easy rhymes or facile ideas.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn, Pt. 2 [OST]
    The latest edition stays true to the blueprint, enlisting a broad swath of artists of varying degrees of fame and genre.
    • 67 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    A Different Me
    Throughout, though, Cole emphatically dares to be different--and pretty great.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Sisterworld
    Like everything else the band has done since it graduated at the top of New York City’s millennial post-punk class, the songs are sometimes off-putting material, requiring patience.
    • 48 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    If Not Now, When?
    Stabbing steadily at the status quo, these songs are a matured balance between art and pop.
    • 75 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Centipede Hz
    Those who decried the last album's lack of spontaneity will be satisfied with Centipede Hz, but it hits hardest when the guys lock into something that works.
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