Los Angeles Times' Scores

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For 1,599 reviews, this publication has graded:
  • 62% higher than the average critic
  • 3% same as the average critic
  • 35% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 0.1 points lower than other critics. (0-100 point scale)
Average Music review score: 73
Highest review score: 100 Chemtrails Over the Country Club
Lowest review score: 25 The New Game
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 1,361 out of 1599
  2. Mixed: 176 out of 1599
  3. Negative: 62 out of 1599
1599 music reviews
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    • 69 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Kill the Lights
    Bryan, never a particularly flexible singer, sounds even more wooden than usual in these tracks; for the first time, this 39-year-old father of two seems a bit embarrassed here, which threatens to topple the whole enterprise.... The singer is far more convincing in the album’s slower, quieter tunes.
    • 68 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Peace Is the Mission
    The third studio album from Major Lazer, Diplo's project inspired by Jamaican dancehall music, features a few hot tracks and a few so tepid that we need reminders about what made Diplo interesting in the first place.
    • 67 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Seth Avett and Jessica Lea Mayfield Sing Elliott Smith
    It rarely puts the original material in a new light or reveals much about songs that were already close to perfect.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Fifty Shades of Grey [Original Motion Picture Soundtrack]
    At 16 tracks, though, Fifty Shades of Grey is a bit of a slog, with too many dreary midtempo numbers--by Sia, Laura Welsh and Skylar Grey--that only feel more glazed (and less enticing) the longer you listen.
    • 60 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Smoke + Mirrors
    Smoke + Mirrors puts across strong feelings, but it refuses to reveal how they work.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Art of McCartney
    If only the others brought aboard were extended as much freedom to do something other than trace outlines over the contours of this familiar canon.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Motion
    The presence of those strong women [Gwen Stefani and Haim] does wonders for Harris’ amped-up music. They bring out the man, not the meathead, in the machine.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    1989
    1989 is a deeply catchy, sleekly-produced pop record with the slightly juiceless quality of an authorized biography, a would-be tell-all bleached of the detailed insight she’s trained us to expect from her.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    ...And Star Power
    ...And Star Power is scattered, often silly and mostly inconsequential.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    PlectrumElectrum
    He and band move through riffs, guitar solos and drum fills with a compact tightness that shouldn't surprise; Prince is a legendary taskmaster. The problem, though, is that half the songs, most obviously "White Caps," don't pop, don't scream for replay and should have landed on the cutting-room floor.
    • 55 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Partners
    Most of the dozen tracks on Partners-- which features duet partners such as Michael Bublé, Andrea Bocelli and the singer’s son, Jason Gould--offer no such vantage [of a whole other way of looking at [a] song].... Yet there is strong work here--four songs that live up to the singer's stated ambition.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Songs of Innocence
    Don't expect a record as breathtaking as U2 at its best. Rather, this is average-grade stuff with a couple essential songs.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Yes!
    Eventually all this mellow reflection begins to resemble a retreat rather than an advance.
    • 51 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    A Town Called Paradise
    This album is a purposeful move into Top 40 that misses the quirk of well written pop and the sonic inventions of EDM.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    While You Were Sleeping
    In his determination to establish his own lane, though, James has let his once-strong songwriting sag.
    • 53 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Animal Ambition: An Untamed Desire to Win
    The sonic equivalent of a blooper reel with a few solid highlights edited in to remind us of the player he once was, the 11-song album mostly rehashes ideas he's ruminated on with more focus and skill in earlier work.
    • 67 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    G I R L
    This is pop music, and it's all in good fun.... I just wish the recipe would have included a touch more poetry.
    • 49 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    A Mary Christmas
    Mostly, however, she's operating in the Mormon Tabernacle Choir end of the musical spectrum, with arrangements emphasizing massed orchestral and choral forces often overwhelming the songs.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    The Hunger Games: Catching Fire [Original Motion Picture Soundtrack]
    Picked by music supervisor Alexandra Patsavas, the second volume has a lot of good makeout songs and just as many calls for courage.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    The Electric Lady
    Though long and featuring a bounty of ideas, The Electric Lady is surprisingly slight.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Exhibitionists
    However well-crafted and hummable it is, Exhibitionists is hardly groundbreaking. Each song feels borrowed rather than handmade.
    • 59 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Blurred Lines
    Blurred Lines is a celebration of plasticine funk, warbly bass and plump booties.... Just as often, though, Thicke and his producers, which include himself and collaborators Pro J, Dr. Luke and Timbaland, dip from the cheesier realms of '70s pop.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Where Does This Door Go
    Where Does This Door Go feels like a once-promising OK Cupid date that's gone off the rails.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    The Wack Album
    The Wack Album feels awfully short on fresh ideas.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Life on a Rock
    Chesney's tone-deafness here seems especially egregious because it's surrounded by better, smarter material.
    • 48 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    I Love You
    The band does black and white, but nothing in between.
    • 51 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    I Am Not a Human Being II
    mostly, I Am Not a Human Being II shows us Lil Wayne responding weakly to the unsettling prospect of weakness.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Two Lanes of Freedom
    The album should keep him atop the country commercial firmament, but doesn't really advance him as an artist.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Trouble Man: Heavy Is the Head
    It surrounds a handful of his sharpest, most insightful songs with far less effective material--tracks that either vague out into club-rap utility or sag hopelessly under the weight of cornball sentiment.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Vicious Lies and Dangerous Rumors
    In his quest to impress, Big Boi short-changes the street-level swagger that always kept his partner Andre 3000 here on Earth.
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