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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    • 65 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Mylo Xyloto
    Coldplay has a formula, and formula prevails on Mylo Xyloto despite Eno's presence.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Songs of Innocence
    Songs of Innocence comes off as flat and strangely complacent, even as it pays lip service to youthful inspiration, notably the punk and post-punk of the late '70s.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Here Lies Love
    Both Byrne and Fatboy Slim have built careers on beats, the imperative of activating the hips as much as the brain, and they touch on everything from salsa to Philadelphia soul on Here Lies Love. But too often the needs of the narrative supersede the music, and too much of "Here Lies Love" falls into midtempo blandness.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Come Around Sundown
    In search of the grandiose, Kings of Leon seem to have forgotten how to rock. It's as if the quartet wanted to become the next U2 so badly that it lost sight of how it got here in the first place.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Talk That Talk
    "Talk That Talk" sounds like a rush job designed to keep Rihanna rolling through the holidays.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Ye
    About half the album has West as a role player on tracks that suggest a theater scene, with a handful of voices playing characters (quite possibly all living inside West’s brain). The album moves from spoken-word monologues to more expansive musical settings that try to “take the top off (and) let the sun come in.”
    • 63 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Babel
    The real issue with Mumford & Sons is its pedestrian songwriting and predictable delivery.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Lonely Avenue
    The pianist has a malleable voice, capable of swinging from poignance to sarcasm, though sometimes Hornby's dense wordplay can't help but sound awkward in making the transition from the page to the speakers.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    I'm with You
    [The] Los Angeles' funk jesters sound like they're treading water.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Recovery
    For an artist who has sold 30 million albums, his latest release is brutally short on hooks and, most of all, fun. The subversive humor is long gone, and his cultural references (David Cook? Austin Powers? Yet another dis of Mariah Carey?) remain dated.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Kisses on the Bottom
    These songs are meant to swing, but McCartney lets them plod.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    The Head and the Heart
    More problematic are the melodies and the songs themselves; they strive for rousing resonance, a deep sense of loss, but often settle for pat prettiness and easy sentimentality.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Finally Rich
    Keef is a remote presence on his major-label debut.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Born to Die
    After all the hub-bub of recent weeks, one of Lee's greatest songs sums up Del Rey's grand entrance: "Is That All There Is?"
    • 62 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Christmas In The Heart
    Dylan’s craggy voice isn’t really equipped for crooning, so the sometimes middle-brow orchestration and singing--particularly the use of backing choirs--sounds like a misguided attempt to sweeten a dish best served lightly salted.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Untitled
    Strings, guitars and keyboards add color in carefully measured doses. The songs never develop much beyond their initial verse and chorus and rarely bother with contrasting bridge sections, but that’s the point: No jarring changes to throw off the mood.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Before I Self Destruct
    His rhyme battle with Eminem on 'Psycho' has zero redeeming value, but the two old pros fire away with glee trying to out-psychopath each other. But about halfway through the album, 50 Cent detours from the street to the bedroom.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Ghost Stories
    Variation, once a strong suit of Coldplay’s songwriting, isn’t much in evidence. Over nine songs, Martin and company create a mood and then stick with it--to a fault.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Black Panties
    Kelly is best when he is at his most absurd, comical and over-the-top.... Sometimes, the jokes go too far.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    ARTPOP
    For all that firepower, the music is catchy but tame--she's cozying up to chart-topping formulas rather than disrupting them.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Prism
    Though not exactly spiritual, Prism does come off as a more serious--if no less formulaic--album than its predecessor. But being taken seriously may be Perry’s greatest challenge yet.
    • 60 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Storytone
    The orchestral Storytone comes off as a showy distraction. It's best ignored. Head for the acoustic version instead, which contains a handful of Young's better recent songs, syrup-free.
    • 60 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Magna Carta Holy Grail
    Mostly, this overstuffed album is about Jay-Z and the self-congratulation of his high-powered friends.
    • 60 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Tha Carter IV
    At his best, Wayne was positively psychedelic in his wordplay, capable of creating entire alternative worlds out of a few surrealist metaphors. But he sounds slower, more methodical, less unhinged on Tha Carter IV.
    • 60 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    A Head Full of Dreams
    On most of the album, Coldplay's relatively buoyant music tries to submerge the band's most annoying trait. But sometimes Chris Martin, lyricist, just can't help himself.
    • 59 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Blurred Lines
    It’s an album that discourages sitting still. Too bad the icky lyrics ruin the mood.
    • 58 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    You and I
    You and I is more a raw sketch than a fully formed portrait of a 26-year-old artist still coming to terms with what he wanted to say and how he wanted to say it.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Nobody's Daughter
    Songwriters Linda Perry and Billy Corgan (moonlighting from the Smashing Pumpkins), producer Michael Beinhorn--sand down her rough edges and turn Nobody's Daughter into a dreary piece of middle-of-the-road product.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Peace Trail
    Young remains a treasure because he refuses to bow to convention, and his inherent distrust of studio sugarcoating or polishing has led to some of the rawest, most powerful music of our time. But it can also lead to slapdash projects such as this one.
    • 56 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Drogas Light
    It falters beneath its own cynicism. Rather than continuing to forge his own sound in tandem with longtime producer Soundtrakk, he chooses to co-opt mainstream currency--the gangsta tropes of trap music, the club rhythms of EDM--and delivers a mix of parody and second-rate would-be radio singles.
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