L.A. Weekly's Scores

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For 70 reviews, this publication has graded:
  • 64% higher than the average critic
  • 2% same as the average critic
  • 34% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 1.5 points lower than other critics. (0-100 point scale)
Average Music review score: 71
Highest review score: 90 Holy Wood (In the Shadow of the Valley of Death)
Lowest review score: 10 Bridge
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 54 out of 70
  2. Mixed: 10 out of 70
  3. Negative: 6 out of 70
70 music reviews
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    • 83 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    In Search Of... [Second Version]
    An early contender for album of the year.
    • 60 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Music Kills Me
    It’s on the more open instrumental jam sessions -- "Dead Can Dance"'s pseudo-bossa tempos and especially the bluesy twang of "Highway to Heaven" -- that they distinguish themselves as live players eagerly retrofitting rock/dance hybrids.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Walking With Thee
    Sure, the songs are short, fast and catchy, but Clinic isn't filling prescriptions for ear candy; the music cuts into you with a desolate, sarcastic, scalpel-sharp edge.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Under Rug Swept
    Under Rug Swept is Alanis Morissette in top form, exercising her God-given right to vent and sound beautiful doing so.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Come With Us
    Come With Us is too much of a mixed bag to induce a full-length journey; it’s best experienced in short walkabouts.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Point
    Point is even weirder than previous Cornelius records, even if its emphasis on acoustic guitars makes it seem uncharacteristically mellow at first listen.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Iron Flag
    Iron Flag owes its lack of cohesion to some simply dull songs, plus the growing disparity in lyrical ability among the Wu’s members.
    • 71 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Experience: Jill Scott
    Remedies some problems and amplifies others.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Insignificance
    The fly in the ointment is the lyric content, which plumbs depths of misanthropy that make labelmate Bill Callahan (Smog) sound like Bobby McFerrin.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Party Music
    Not as consistent as The Coup’s outstanding Steal This Album from 1998, Party Music still manages to be one of 2001’s best.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Regeneration
    Devoid of the cartoonish cabaret crooning of 1997’s breakthrough Cassanova, Regeneration is more down-to-earth, with less grandstanding and more adventurousness.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Alive To Every Smile
    If Alive to Every Smile doesn’t indicate Wratten is ready to move on thematically, it does show him evolving musically.
    • 87 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    The Argument
    The Argument provides a rough blueprint for Fugazi’s current music: more melodic, fascinated as much with miniatures as grand anthems, more tensed, better prepared for the inevitable explosions.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Epitaph
    Played quiet, Epitaph is like rain on the roof; when you’re rattling the casements with the monster bass, it’s like an air mattress.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Her Mystery Not of High Heels and Eye Shadow
    His songs are beautiful if simple ballads to whatever crosses his fancy.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Beautifulgarbage
    The sound of a band blissfully uncoiling under the sun of self-assurance.
    • 88 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    The Blueprint
    Blueprint is his best since debuting with Reasonable Doubt in 1996.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    The Coast Is Never Clear
    There’s more going on here than mere escapist fare.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Toxicity
    Cast in layers upon layers of aural intricacy, Toxicity charters new frontiers, yet it’s still grinding rock at its most deafening.
    • 70 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Go Plastic
    His best effort yet.
    • 71 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Gorillaz
    Hands down, this is one of the best-produced albums of the year...
    • 68 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    10,000 Hz Legend
    The resulting mélange doesn’t always work, but the songs on 10,000HZ Legend still succeed often enough to override the record’s occasional shortcomings.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Argyle Heir
    Argyle Heir is the Brooklyn-based combo’s most perfect recording, loaded with gently baroque, quietly cinematic tunes that leisurely melt away in your head.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Everybody Got Their Something
    In a just universe, Nikka Costa, with her near-perfect American debut, Everybody Got Their Something, would become the ‘00s answer to Janis Joplin, Teena Marie and Like a Virginal Madonna.
    • 75 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    The Invisible Man
    Eitzel’s written with genuine warmth before, but it’s been several albums since he’s backed it with sounds that stand on their own this well.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Exciter
    Mellow, dramatic and bathed in atmosphere, Exciter is the sound of a band at the height of its powers.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Dizzy Spells
    If I were suddenly appointed Minister of Improving Music, my inaugural act would involve sending shock troops to ransack the CD racks of every would-be cookie-cutter punk in, say, Orange County, replacing all recordings by Social D. and Suicidal T. with copies of Dizzy Spells.
    • 68 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Just Enough Education To Perform
    The clean-cut Stereophonics are the Black Crowes you could take home to your mom, only with stronger songs and without the high school histrionics.
    • 70 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Scorpion
    Scorpion propels her into pop stardom’s embrace, smartly blending party anthems with thug themes.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Girls Can Tell
    Perverse as it may seem, this album is more tightly arranged and crisply recorded than anything the group managed on a major label; in fact, it’s a small masterpiece of home production, with Eno’s economical drumming framing stabs of rhythm guitar and precisely placed daubs of vibes and viola.
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