Chicago Tribune's Scores

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For 566 reviews, this publication has graded:
  • 51% higher than the average critic
  • 3% same as the average critic
  • 46% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 0.3 points lower than other critics. (0-100 point scale)
Average Music review score: 73
Highest review score: 100 I Like to Keep Myself in Pain
Lowest review score: 25 Graffiti
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 456 out of 566
  2. Mixed: 97 out of 566
  3. Negative: 13 out of 566
566 music reviews
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    • 71 Metascore
    • 88 Critic Score
    Fragrant World
    Fragrant World may initially come off as messy, even chaotic. But the trio of Anand Wilder, Chris Keating and Ira Wolf Tuten are on to something worth absorbing all the same.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 75 Critic Score
    Researching the Blues
    The band doesn't break much ground--if you loved their '90s albums, chances are you'll appreciate this one. But maturity has its own rewards.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 88 Critic Score
    Gossamer
    The onetime bedroom artist now makes first-rate pop anthems, gleaming rocketships of sound that wouldn't sound out of place on the radio next to Rihanna or Nicki Minaj. The tone might seem out of step with the lyrics, but it speaks to a certain resilience.
    • 92 Metascore
    • 88 Critic Score
    Channel Orange
    Channel Orange creates a state of mind with words and sound.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 75 Critic Score
    Unsound
    With Unsound, Conley, Miller and Prescott have now made four good to great albums since returning from a two-decade hiatus.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 88 Critic Score
    Slaughterhouse
    Slaughterhouse is the fourth album the ultra-prolific Ty Segall has released in the last 18 months, and it's the best of the bunch.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 75 Critic Score
    Banga
    For the rest of her 11th studio album she makes good on her word, drawing connections across history between cultures, generations and genres of music.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 88 Critic Score
    The Cherry Thing
    It's spontaneous music, full of first-take twists, turns and surprises that somehow coheres as a transcendent album.
    • 38 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Fortune
    Chris Brown's fifth studio album, Fortune, is a pure-pop candy cane, meant to be enjoyed, consumed and forgotten.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 75 Critic Score
    Write Me Back
    Listeners may find themselves toggling between questioning Kelly's sincerity and admiring his facility as a producer and singer.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 88 Critic Score
    Celebration Rock
    What makes this album so powerful and moving is the way that innocence erodes in its second half.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 88 Critic Score
    Oceania
    Several of those tracks anchor Oceania, which adds up to Corgan's best work since the '90s.
    • 89 Metascore
    • 88 Critic Score
    The Idler Wheel Is Wiser than the Driver of the Screw and Whipping Cords Will Serve You More than Ropes Will Ever Do
    It makes for a raw, unsettling listen, tempered by shots of dark humor.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 88 Critic Score
    Falling Off the Sky
    "Falling Off the Sky" sounds like the work of a band still very much at the top of its game.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 75 Critic Score
    The Bravest Man in the Universe
    It adds up to Womack's strongest work since the early '80s.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 88 Critic Score
    Big Station
    Escovedo's growing confidence as a band leader and especially as a vocalist has never been more apparent.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 100 Critic Score
    I Like to Keep Myself in Pain
    I Like to Keep Myself in Pain works as both a career summing up and a fascinating introduction to one of the most accomplished, underappreciated vocalists of the last two decades.
    • 68 Metascore
    • 88 Critic Score
    Americana
    Americana reveals the hard truth inside songs that have been taken for granted.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    What We Saw from the Cheap Seats
    Most of the songs are so flat that the singer sounds constrained.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 63 Critic Score
    Not Your Kind of People
    Most of the rest holds up as credible but hardly ground-breaking pop-rock, an album that proves Garbage still exists even if it hasn't necessarily come up with any new tricks.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 88 Critic Score
    Cancer4Cure
    Few artists create a tougher, colder world as convincingly.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 100 Critic Score
    R.A.P. Music
    With R.A.P. Music he's added a must-hear chapter to the hip-hop bible.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 75 Critic Score
    The Only Place
    Cool little touches abound, from the chiming percussion that enhances the dusky "Dreaming My Life Away" to the waltz-time vocal coda in "Last Year."
    • 78 Metascore
    • 63 Critic Score
    Bloom
    It adds up to an album that presents a fluffier version of an already pillow-soft sound.
    • 75 Metascore
    • 75 Critic Score
    OFF!
    The album blurs past in less than 16 minutes and then demands to be played again.
    • 71 Metascore
    • 75 Critic Score
    Time's All Gone
    Waterhouse's pleasingly wrecked guitar playing is matched by singing that teeters out of control every so often, like he's trying to tamp down a wild animal in his throat.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 25 Critic Score
    Dr. Dee
    The soundtrack strives for a quirky, melancholy resonance befitting its tragic subject, but too often it comes off as gimmicky and ponderous.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 88 Critic Score
    Master of My Make-Believe
    White's subversive way with a hook and her ability to effortlessly blend dance beats from around the world make "Master of My Make-Believe" a deceptively breezy and enticing summer album.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 75 Critic Score
    Little Broken Hearts
    Not everything works. The closing "All a Dream" is a six-minute drag back to sleepy-time Norah. But mostly, Jones plays her part in this career left-turn with chilled and sometimes chilling resolve.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 88 Critic Score
    Blunderbuss
    It makes for an entertaining rollercoaster of a listen.
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