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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    • 76 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Shall Noise Upon
    Apollo Sunshine still aspires to create a self-contained immersion experience, an attitude that, more than any particular strain of their dabbling, makes the band a welcome kind of happening.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Sex And Gasoline
    Sex & Gasoline is a really a continuation of what Rodney Crowell has been doing since his return to recording in 2001 with the brilliant, semi-autobiography of "The Houston Kid."
    • 88 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Exit
    Exit, which was mixed and recorded on a laptop, using a popular program called Pro Tools, is a tribute to the unexpected beauty of everyday things.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    L.A.X.
    LAX spins beautifully at first, but, like a '64 Chevy with chrome rims that hasn't paid a visit to the mechanic in 20 years, it doesn't take long before the wheels come off entirely.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Sol-Angel And The Hadley St. Dreams
    This is such a smartly executed, classy set of songs that's miles away from the hoochie pop being turned out by young female R&B vocalists these days.... As long as she keeps things flowing and upbeat, things hum and only the two gauzy ballads (including a duet with the undervalued Bilal on 'Cosmic Journey') miss the mark.
    • 75 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    The Rhumb Line
    The Rhumb Line--defined as a straight-shot line across all meridians, for the geospatially uninitiated--mostly just thrums with an uncommon sort of pop radiance.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    You & Me
    Much has been made of Leithauser's voice, which often feels choked, but on You & Me, could one imagine a more perfect instrument?
    • 70 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Meet Glen Campbell
    What appear to be strange song choices on paper are risks that pay off.... Although he has his moments of sentimentality on John Lennon's 'Grow Old With Me' and the Velvet Underground's 'Jesus,' Campbell is still a formidable interpreter of song who even overcomes heavy-handed production to remind us why he was always our favorite charismatic pop-music cowboy.
    • 53 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    The Illusion Of Progress
    Most of all, the music packs as much punch as ever--and more variety, as Staind sometimes departs from its rock-metal power ballads for tunes that suggest Pink Floyd and even Brit band Oasis in the chiming-guitar pop of 'All I Want.'
    • 67 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Raw Footage
    Older and wiser doesn't mean played out, and his rhymes are wittier and more tightly coiled than most of his younger peers.
    • 88 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Invisible Cinema
    Invisible Cinema is the opposite of a silent film. The soundtrack is provided; the listener brings the visuals.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    A Little Bit Longer
    Luckily, the New Jersey trio also continues to bolster its puppy-love perspective with an increasingly substantial brand of power pop that grows more palatable to the general population with each release.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Simply Grand
    Simply Grand is an album whose charms are too subtle to catch on the first spin or third, but enough listens will make it clear that the album's title is nothing more than a statement of fact.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    An Invitation
    An Invitation must have been a fun side project, but it may have all the permanence of the summer breeze it captures so perfectly.
    • 55 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Look What You Made Me
    As an MC, Berg is workmanlike with few crisp rhymes and bereft of ideas beyond lining his pocketbook.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Conor Oberst
    With Oberst, there is little filter; the gems and the rubbish all emerge from the same place. Oberst's talent and his unevenness are all of a kind.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Harps And Angels
    40 years after his debut, the curly-haired songwriter continues to play to his strength: three-minute social commentaries that might sound bitter if they weren't so funny.
    • 60 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Lessons In Love
    Certainly it's a listenable set--well produced, well-sung and, well, dull.
    • 71 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    New York City
    The album bumps from electronica to cabaret to jazz and back again; it's busy but never feels schizophrenic.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    22 Dreams
    Weller can seem like a dilettante, selling himself as Roy Harper one minute and Marvin Gaye the next. But that's easily forgiven. At least the Mod-father isn't resting on his laurels.
    • 75 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Partie Traumatic
    While there's a certain bubblegum synth-pop allure and cheeky lyrical irony in songs like 'I've Underestimated My Charm (Again),' it's hard to find ourselves being carried away on youthful pluck and preciousness alone.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Donkey
    Donkey favors texture over attitude, and while the boozy, shouted choruses remain, CSS now favors a subtler approach.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Breakout
    With Breakout, Cyrus has clearly made a choice to break from the shiny, happy "Hannah Montana" character, but she hasn't scuffed her sound up so much that her fans won't recognize that she's just being Miley.
    • 70 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Something For All Of Us...
    Canning's effort, however, is a bit of a departure, as he assumes the mostly unfamiliar lead-vocalist role. It suits him well.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Stay Positive
    Ultimately, Stay Positive achieves the admirable feat of being a record you can listen closely to or rock out to, equally adaptable to late-night wallowing and the party at the water tower.
    • 71 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Untitled
    The new album, immersed in a soul-funk sound with guest spots from the Stylistics and the Last Poets, is contradictory at times, but the idea of building hope through about an hour's worth of music supersedes any effort to brew controversy.
    • 75 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Life Death Love and Freedom
    Eschewing any concept of "radio ready" and singing with a gruff immediacy, Mellencamp tackles all of the titular concepts on this folk- and blues-based material with a sense of liberation that is keenly palpable.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Greatest Story Ever Told
    It's angry and compelling, but it's also offset by his indulgence in the worst hip-hop clichés and the stereotypes he often derides.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Around The Bend
    His interpretive use of his rich, burnished baritone has never been better, and that remarkable voice is still a force to be reckoned with.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Modern Guilt
    With 10 songs clocking in at just 33 minutes, Modern Guilt feels fleeting, even temporal, and that seems to be the point. It's destined to be an artifact of an age that's rocketing, Beck suspects, toward oblivion.
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