Dot Music's Scores
- Music
For 1,511 reviews, this publication has graded:
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55% higher than the average critic
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2% same as the average critic
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43% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 3.7 points lower than other critics.
(0-100 point scale)
Average Music review score: 69
Highest review score: | Untitled | |
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Lowest review score: | United Nations of Sound |
Score distribution:
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Positive: 1,005 out of 1511
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Mixed: 449 out of 1511
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Negative: 57 out of 1511
1511
music
reviews
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- Dot Music
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While it's certainly refreshing to hear Oberst refrain from swaddling his emotionally-driven conceits in rock statesman's clothing, much of Conor Oberst seems too comfortably by-the-book to really leap off the page.- Dot Music
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Perhaps with a bit more effort converting the jams into actual songs this would have been a worthy jump off as opposed to the album's incandescent highlight. Your forecast then, occasional flashes of brilliance but largely dreary.- Dot Music
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This is bound to be praised to the hilt as the Next Big Thing, but rock outfit At The Drive In have only one thing going in their favour - the absence of competition. It's so close to being something beautiful, something to cling on to in these aurally barren times, but it's just so not quite.- Dot Music
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It's a mixed bag certainly and while nothing else here scales the heights of the single that's made his name thus far, there are plenty of moments of pop confection steered with a degree of sophistication to suggest he's more than a one trick pony.- Dot Music
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- Dot Music
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Large parts of this album sound as if designed specifically to be played to fields full of semi-comatose revellers.- Dot Music
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- Dot Music
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They've got one song, basically. It's a fairly good song, comprising driving, rama-lama rhythms and pitch-dark lyrical content; but repeated 10 times in fairly mild variations, it inevitably loses its appeal.- Dot Music
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“Anniemal” is a textbook pop album – with all the passion that entails (i.e. none).- Dot Music
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Sometimes it's almost too much "classic Springsteen"; too many songs seem like retreads.- Dot Music
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- Dot Music
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A fractional disappointment after 'Emergency Rations', perhaps. But still, Def Jux's reputation as the most consistent hip-hop label in the world circa now remains unsullied.- Dot Music
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Perhaps it's no surprise that eighth album Let England Shake is the first for which Harvey does not appear on the sleeve.- Dot Music
- Posted Feb 15, 2011
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Sadly for such weighty themes of trust, betrayal, loneliness, living out of a suitcase and long distance relationships, the lack of true darkness amongst the sweetness and light is a little frustrating.- Dot Music
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Attempting such an ambitious concept in an age of diminished attention spans should no doubt be applauded, but overstretching itself in a stab at immortality, "Stadium Arcadium" marks a step backwards from 2002's "By The Way".- Dot Music
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There are moments where the mini-pops Joy Division approach hits paydirt, notably on the relentless, single-minded surge of the single, 'Bigger Than Us'. But mostly the trio are at their best when they wriggle free from the colossal shadows they're hiding under.- Dot Music
- Posted Jan 20, 2011
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Their dedication to refined, pretty songs means there's a very narrow scope here that didn't afflict Grizzly Bear's "Veckatimest" and which makes proceedings here sound a little wan and wishy-washy after a while.- Dot Music
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- Dot Music
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There could be a better band in there than the production lets them be.- Dot Music
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Daft Punk have done their homework, and there's enough here to suggest that, with a bit of debugging, they'll have no problem hitting all the right buttons next time.- Dot Music
- Posted Jan 3, 2011
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- Dot Music
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Too many tracks sound like tired Wu cast offs saved from the studio floor to prove that he's capable of doing this in his sleep.- Dot Music
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The psychic bruising Okereke has sustained playing the East London fame game during the past 12 months has produced self-pitying lyrics that frequently state the bleeding obvious.- Dot Music
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- Dot Music
- Posted Mar 9, 2011
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Calvin Harris does nothing out of the ordinary, but still, he does it well.- Dot Music
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What we are given this time round is a rather boring queue of unmemorable songs.- Dot Music
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Rowland's big problem is that she has the lungs but not the voice, at least not if we take that to mean something distinctively her own.- Dot Music
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Emergency isn't quite the great leap that was expected but does at least carry a few optimistic signs for the future.- Dot Music
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It would be unfair to dismiss the record completely, however, as there are definite highlights.- Dot Music
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For fans, a job well done, and surely appreciated. For the rest, digestion of any of Luna's five studio albums may be advisable first.- Dot Music
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The full band approach seems to weigh things down so heavily you can almost see the red welts on the shoulders of its two leaders.- Dot Music
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Could 'Blood Pressure' restore The Kills fortunes to their early glory days? It would seem that Hince's luck might be running out.- Dot Music
- Posted Apr 11, 2011
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Given their youth, it does indeed promise much, but please, hold off on that honours listing for a while yet.- Dot Music
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While Relapse is a slightly more energised record than the listless "Encore" (despite a Dr Dre production that is, for the most part, tired and dated), it's hardly the comeback many hoped for.- Dot Music
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Where once Macca seduced us with great melodies, simple songs and great musicians, here the musical sledgehammer is on show too often.- Dot Music
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While one could be forgiven for dismissing American VI as the scrapings of a barrel, the truth is that five of its ten tracks are worthy additions to the Cash canon; no more, no less.- Dot Music
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A long 14 tracks, it's fairly unfocused and though the pair have done enough to prove that they're not just out to annoy, there is still something fundamentally unsatisfying going on here.- Dot Music
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To be fair, "The Loon" stops short of pastiche, but it is too transparently a paean to Tape 'n Tapes' heroes.- Dot Music
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Girls And Weather is so cloyingly cheerful and eager to please that it might as well be "Big Brother" audition tape.- Dot Music
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While she's been guilty of gluing sure-fire singles together with rotten fillers on her previous two albums, Britney uses this opportunity to take the odd risk and adds a welcome edge to her sound.- Dot Music
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Imagine "Hello Nasty" if it had entirely consisted of "Three MCs And One DJ" and you're close to understanding exactly how "To The 5 Boroughs" sounds.- Dot Music
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The change is clear from the outset with 'In The Mode' sounding like an album made by an act that no longer feels the need to pamper its audience. Gone are the gently loping double bass grooves and feathery vocals, replaced by a feverishly paced percussive assault that challenges both vocalists and live instruments alike to keep up.- Dot Music
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Lazily accomplished without ever truly igniting, a classy update on a slightly dated hip-hop sound.- Dot Music
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This is the first Muse album to sound - brace yourself, outrageous melodrama fans - ordinary.- Dot Music
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He's spitting distance from a brilliant concept album about love and suburbia, but he keeps pulling back.- Dot Music
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- Dot Music
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Much more of this and Shakira will surely take over the whole world with her mix of unthreatening pop / rock, lovingly naïve lyrics and cute tummy.- Dot Music
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It's an album for well-mannered emotional crises in front of log fires, a soundtrack for quivering bottom lips.- Dot Music
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At its best “The Silent Hours” is a robust, reasonably straight ahead rock record and at its worst, a lumpen, forgettable distraction.- Dot Music
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This may be the point at which even those well-disposed to the nice and the quirky start to note diminishing returns.- Dot Music
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One crucial difference is The Pierces' music has changed from something that sounded like awkward whimsy a few years ago into something middle-aged people will like; and that's basically the key to selling loads of records these days.- Dot Music
- Posted Jun 29, 2011
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It makes for a cool sound that might be too inoffensive at times but which grabs all the right places most of the time.- Dot Music
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Intense, grown-up and pretty it may be, but this record does nothing to move the whole cathartic/cinematic genre a millimetre further than where it was a decade ago.- Dot Music
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It's a horribly overlong, confused creation and Aguilera's brash personality and lioness voice are often sacrificed in pursuit of its many different styles. But when its experiments work, she's never sounded so interesting.- Dot Music
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Sliced in half, Kelis' fourth album would be twice as good. As an EP it would be perfect. But in it's current incarnation, it's one to cherry pick from your favourite download store.- Dot Music
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What potentially made Album exciting was that it seemed to understand that pop itself doesn't make sense, and that it can still work just as well with all the wrong notes in all the wrong order.- Dot Music
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The problem is not that The Rakes haven't sought to evolve; it's that they've done so too self-consciously and slipped out of their depth.- Dot Music
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There are some fiendishly catchy hooks and very occasionally a real quality to some of the songwriting, enough to suggest that there are better things to come from the young trio once simply aping the already done-to-death genre du jour has finally lost its appeal.- Dot Music
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If you didnt get 'U.F.Orb' or 'Orblivion', this ain't going to change your mind. If youve never heard The Orb before, though, this is as good an introduction as any.- Dot Music
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Sometimes it works - notably with Gorecki's and Ravel's work - but it frequently misses the mark, with his reinterpretation of Handel's 'Xerxes' sounding something like incidental muzak from a low-budget US soap.- Dot Music
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The best songs on this cunning, efficient, frequently daft and fractionally disappointing album are the ones which sound most like the misty reveries of [their] debut.- Dot Music
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And fortunately, Rickie also goes beyond the cliched songbook, choosing songs which the soaring yet contemplative voice lends itself perfectly to, and makes her own...- Dot Music
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"Afrodisiac" is Brandy’s most personally revealing album to date and her least lyrically fluffy, but its intimacy is hamstrung by the MTV-flavoured, formulaic gloop with which most contemporary, American R&B now seems to be contaminated.- Dot Music
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Night Work, the Sisters third studio album, is both their filthiest and most musically downbeat effort to date.- Dot Music
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His flow remains arguably one of the greatest out there; it would just be nice for him to have a bit more faith in his own mind, rather than those of our uber-producers.- Dot Music
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It's an inferior re-run of the Marilyn Manson hammer horror panto that's been showing since '96.- Dot Music
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Great fun to record, no doubt, and probably great live, but an annoying conceit on record.- Dot Music
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Frankly it makes our blood run cold with images of Sunday supplement purgatory, Spektor trading soft-focus licks with Katie Meluah from out of suburban glove compartments for decades to come. Thankfully the reality is nowhere near as bad as that.- Dot Music
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Aside from the odd pervy foray however, Doo-Wops & Hooligans is a fairly impressive pop record; packed full of guaranteed arena fillers, it's an album that's literally born to be big.- Dot Music
- Posted Jan 25, 2011
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- Dot Music
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There's something about the determinedly primal recording techniques and clunky, 'we-just-learnt-this-today!' instrumentation that doesn't ring true.- Dot Music
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Strip away the fug of patchouli oil and incense and you're left with little more than a shoegazing album played by Kula Shaker.- Dot Music
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In a number of 'mature' developments to their sound they've laid down impeccably produced horns (see bombastic opener 'World War III'), come within millimetres of salacious classic rock in the excellent "Poison Ivy" (watch out for the implied "bitch" in the chorus!) and, on lead single 'Paranoid,' dispensed a chilled-out post-baggy number.- Dot Music
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Musically it is by far and away his most complete offering but some cracks do show.- Dot Music
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Adams can undoubtedly pen this classic rawk stuff with his ears closed and, as a result, the 15 tracks here lack heart.- Dot Music
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All in all, 'Flowers' is simply too nice to be up there with the Bunnymen's finest work, but a worthy record, if only for the few great tracks you will find within.- Dot Music
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Despite the almost universal hyperbole that has greeted 'All That You Can't Leave Behind', this is no masterpiece. Certainly not by U2's stratospheric standards.- Dot Music
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Not tonally consistent enough to work as an ambient record, not sufficiently solidly written to really grab your attention as a suite of songs, Leila's comeback nonetheless numbers some arresting moments worthy of your attention.- Dot Music
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Resurrect[s] the 1970s white ska world of The Specials, The Jam et al with varying degrees of success.- Dot Music
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It is not a terrible album by any means; just an unfocussed and sprawling one.- Dot Music
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Given the fact there are 25 tracks and a platoon of songwriters spread over Doll Domination's various bonus discs, it's not surprising that it occasionally succeeds, and there are hit singles to be found here.- Dot Music
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Throughout, Southampton's own R Kelly, as silky-voiced as ever, seems determined to seize hold of his iffy image and re-establish his old school soul credentials.- Dot Music
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For all that she's miraculously clawed back here, the one thing that eludes her is the one thing that made her exceptional: her voice. Without it she's just another R&B singer, and, good as it is in places, I Look To You is just another R&B album.- Dot Music
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The Bachelor has more than a whiff of a histrionic West End musical confined to a primary school assembly hall which means it's 10 out of 10 for effort, but for execution...- Dot Music
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What niggles is that many of the songs aren’t whole enough or, if we’re honest (and it’s hard because he’s just so darn loveable and charming), good enough for an album. Even superior compositions like “Art Teacher” suffer under this record’s careless construction.- Dot Music
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Thematically, "Born Again In The USA" is a bold album that tries hard - perhaps too hard - to bind together the inter-related twines of culture, politics, history and entertainment.- Dot Music
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So, we have a maturing Ms Lavigne, distancing herself from the teen antics of her "Let Go" debut, but struggling to find any stories worth telling save for boyfriend trouble and dead grandparents.- Dot Music
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They seem keen to hold a mirror up to familiar pop tropes, but in doing so only reveal themselves for what they are - a gang of weirdoes carrying guitars. Perversely, their eagerness to engage the mainstream attention span often seems obnoxious in itself.- Dot Music
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They’ve returned to the clamorous, powerchord-packed rock of their debut, with the inevitable result that it sounds fixed firmly by the formaldehyde of fashion in mid-90s post-grunge.- Dot Music
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On the whole Pivot seem hesitant to surrender anything of themselves--they've sacrificed the time taken to craft the whole dextrous thing, of course, but the temptation is to see that as slightly indulgent when there seems little attempt to ensnare the ears of others.- Dot Music
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There are a couple of songs so overfamiliar that Boyle can do little to revitalise them, including a predictable trudge through 'Auld Lang Syne' and the saccharine overdose of 'Away In A Manger', but Boyle herself once again emerges from trashy circumstances with class intact.- Dot Music
- Posted Dec 8, 2010
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Taken in three-minute doses, 'D-D-Don't Stop The Beat' sounds fantastic. Taken all at once, it's proof that too much fun can be hard to bear.- Dot Music
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There are few absolute duffers here: '3D' makes for a perfectly pleasant 50 minutes of slick and homogenised R&B. It's just that, from such a reputable firm - and at such an emotional and auspicious point in their career - it's impossible not to expect more.- Dot Music
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- Dot Music
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G.O.A.T.' is depressingly bereft of considered content. There's nothing outrageous or offensive, just plenty of the unthinking and inarticulate sex talk that L's been spouting between the brags for years.- Dot Music
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