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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    • 82 Metascore
    • 100 Critic Score
    City of Refuge
    It probably wasn't her intention, but Washburn ended up making a modern classic, a folk album for people who claim they don't like a such thing.
    • 88 Metascore
    • 100 Critic Score
    Masseduction
    It’s a jittering, coruscating sucker punch of an album--and St. Vincent’s first bona fide masterpiece.
    • 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.
    • 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."
    • 81 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Drums And Guns
    Magnificent.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    We'll Never Turn Back
    [It] seems like the album the 66-year-old singer was born to make
    • 62 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    The Sun And The Moon
    This easily ranks among the top rock records of the year.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    The World Has Made Me The Man Of My Dreams
    It's untamed, topsy-turvy, elliptical - and one of the most exciting albums I've heard all year.
    • 70 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Family
    The result is the best, most cogent album of her career.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Revival
    This album is not just a revival, but a complete rejuvenation for John Fogerty. It's easily his best solo record, and what makes it so special is that he embraces his swamp-rocking Creedence Clearwater Revival days.
    • 75 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Consolers Of The Lonely
    Not content to merely shake up the music industry by releasing Consolers with only one week's advance notice, the Raconteurs have also had the nerve to drop a near-classic album.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    The Hard Way
    On one of this year's smoothest and best discs, Hunter makes The Hard Way go down so easy.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Two Men With The Blues
    Ten exuberant, tender, casually elegant tracks later you realize - much to your surprise, if you're like me--that the pairing of the grizzled country star and the suave jazz master is an unmitigated, ear-tickling success.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Astral Weeks Live At The Hollywood Bowl
    This is a stroke of genius.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Backspacer
    Backspacer, the band’s ninth studio album [is] one of its most cohesive and satisfying in terms of brevity, crisp production, and a sharp focus.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Teen Dream
    This is industrial-strength Beach House with its hallmarks intact, just bigger and better. With co-producer Chris Coady, Legrand and Scally lift some of the haze that has often enveloped their music...now the band has given us this year’s first classic album.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Heligoland
    The result is a record that alternates between fuzzy and crisp; those who like to get lost in their headphones should approve.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Have One On Me
    Much like a riveting movie keeps you in your seat, you’ll want to pay close attention to Joanna Newsom’s astonishing new album for fear of missing too much of the plot.
    • 90 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Sir Lucious Left Foot: The Son of Chico Dusty
    The album bubbles over with insidious grooves, inventive samples, and lissome rhyming about things frivolous and fraught.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    The Way Out
    If there's a lesson to be learned from The Way Out, it's that we need little more than the sounds of each other's voices to find comfort--or in the Books' case, to crank out yet another masterwork.
    • 87 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    The Suburbs
    You barely detect it at first, but something miraculous happens on Arcade Fire's revelatory third album. The songs breathe--occasionally in long exhales, sometimes in staccato gasps.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Tomorrow Morning
    An “anything goes” approach to recording, which included opening up to let his bandmates collaborate on the songwriting, pays off in this captivating collection.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Solo
    Solo is Iyer's grand statement, and with it he has fulfilled his promise.
    • 91 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    The Guitar Song
    The Guitar Song comes grouped in two parts, a "Black Album" and a "White Album," structured, according to Johnson, as a progressive movement from a dark and sordid beginning to a reassuring and redemptive end. That structure isn't always discernable in listening. What is immediately evident, though, is that this is a phenomenal collection of country music.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Everything in Between
    Everything in Between is a triumphant leap forward from an already solid foundation, and one that cements the duo as one of this era's incontestably exceptional indie-rock acts.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Halcyon Digest
    Halcyon Digest is as comforting in its familiar feel as it is startling for its sonic variety.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    The Lady Killer
    Anyone who doubted that Green is one of today's most commanding vocalists simply needs to hear how he negotiates moods here and turns phrases with subtlety, wit, and style. Killer stuff.
    • 94 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy
    Maybe it's not surprising that My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy is so seamlessly his personal best.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Northern Aggression
    Northern Aggression rocks as ferociously as anything Wynn has ever done.
    • 75 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Four Stars
    It is an exceedingly agreeable collection of ultra-catchy garage-pop complete with slash-and-burn guitars, wheedling psychedelic organs, gauzy ballads, dollops of Motown stomp, and loads of love laments both despairing and fidgety.
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