Los Angeles Times' Scores

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For 1,598 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 points lower than other critics. (0-100 point scale)
Average Music review score: 73
Highest review score: 100 Dear Science,
Lowest review score: 25 The New Game
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 1,360 out of 1598
  2. Mixed: 176 out of 1598
  3. Negative: 62 out of 1598
1598 music reviews
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    • 58 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Now
    It all sounds great, too, with contributions from a vast array of players and producers, including Matthew Koma, Jacquire King, guitarist Greg Leisz and fiddler Gabe Witcher. The problem is Twain’s singing. ... [Her voice is] lower and less flexible than before, and that works out OK in the slower, moodier stuff here. That’s not the case, though, in the uptempo material, which feels flat and robotic.
    • 58 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Younger Now
    Cyrus’ self-styled country album might be the most weakly considered event record of the year, with lumpy melodies, slapdash rhythms and lyrics that border on self-parody (and not in the way that Nashville’s finest know how to do).
    • 58 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    New Life
    A slickly produced collection of largely generic, meandering songs about self-affirmation in the wake of heartache and romantic disillusionment.
    • 58 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Emotion & Commotion
    Imagine Phil Mickelson in a round of putt-putt and you'll get a sense of what's on the line for Beck's first studio album in seven years.
    • 58 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    If I'm Honest
    The default setting is polished professionalism; rawness actually takes time. And here Shelton seldom pushes beyond that finesse to reach something less smooth. Which doesn’t mean If I’m Honest isn’t pleasure.
    • 58 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    The Dutchess
    The problem is the Duchess herself. Fergie exudes earthy charm, but can't keep up with the breakneck music. She forces emotion on the slower show-stoppers, and she's all cartoon kitten on the come-ons. [17 Sep 2006]
    • Los Angeles Times
    • 57 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Schizophrenic
    Ultimately, all his genre-grazing makes him seem slippery rather than adventurous.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Love Is Dead
    Although her songs occasionally feature the alto piano of Apple or the otherworldly trilling of Morissette or Björk, her voice can sound thin and inconsistent, giving the whole thing a somewhat derivative feel.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Sonic Boom
    The 11 new songs, Kiss' first since 1998's "Psycho Circus," hardly deviate from the band's time-proven formula.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Jigsaw
    Jigsaw tries to find common ground in a now-ubiquitous strain of electro-flavored club rap. It's sonically a good fit for her nimble and still undeniable flow, but the wheels come off whenever Sov's newfound earnestness undermines her insouciant appeal.
    • 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.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Raditude
    The weird aftertaste of Raditude isn't that Cuomo has so surrendered the oddball charm of his band's first two albums, though. It's that his late-career pursuit of mindless, opulent fun is so transparent that it almost taps a deeper vein of interior sadness than anything on "Pinkerton."
    • 56 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Intuition
    Intuition presents a sampler of contemporary R&B styles from producers including Timbaland, Just Blaze, Butter Beats and Calvo Da Gr8, giving the collection a disjointed air.
    • 56 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Rise Up
    Unfortunately, the slick, overproduced headbanger music feels anachronistic and wouldn’t seem out of place on a Korn album. While Cypress Hill remains one of the greatest groups of all time, “Rise Up” mostly flops.
    • 56 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Slash
    Team-ups with Ian Astbury ("Ghost"), Chris Cornell ("Promise") and Wolfmother's Andrew Stockdale ("By the Sword") produce familiar sparks but die out quickly. And a ballad with Adam Levine of Maroon 5, "Gotten," aims for "November Rain" but ends up pretty soggy.
    • 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.
    • 55 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Music of the Spheres
    “Spheres” is in reality no more — or less! — on the nose than Coldplay’s earlier albums.
    • 55 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Man of the Woods
    Expertly appointed but emotionally inert homage to the place that he says made him.
    • 55 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Forgiven
    The ho-hum tunes on Forgiven won't flip your wig, but the playing-- particularly in the three cuts featuring Dr. John on the keys--oozes bone-deep feeling throughout.
    • 55 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    The Great Escape Artist
    While the interplay remains incendiary, the textures freshly incandescent, there isn't much in the way of memorable choruses or hooks.
    • 54 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Wonderland
    It's obvious Aoki is a better tastemaker and label boss than producer, but then, didn't we all dream so big in 2005?
    • 54 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    No Boys Allowed
    In glimpses it reaches that goal--like in maybe half of the sticky and finessed "Breaking Point"--but it's undone by the album's many other contradictory messages.
    • 54 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Play On
    Play On exhibits a distressing lack of dimension for a singer with Underwood's obvious abilities.
    • 54 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Mail On Sunday
    Other than the album's highlight, the resonant break-up song "Still Missin'," Mail on Sunday rarely delivers.
    • 54 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    I Dreamed A Dream
    Boyle is perfectly comfortable singing actual hymns like 'Amazing Grace,' though her take on them is pretty much on a level with any local church's choir star. She's at her worst when she pushes harder; she doesn't know how to build drama, and her throat seems to constrict as she reaches for bigger notes.
    • 54 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Music For Cougars
    These days, of course, the documentary vibe of the band's earlier stuff has transformed into an air of escapism -- not for nothing is one track titled "When We Were Young." But that hardly detracts from the crafty throwaway pleasures at which Sugar Ray still excels; in fact, it actually provides a touch of sweetness that helps temper McGrath's innate sleaze factor.
    • 54 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Music From Another Dimension!
    Music From Another Dimension delivers riffs, clichés, solos, yowls and a virtual banquet of the same one-dimensional tropes Aerosmith has been offering for years. Mixed in, however, are a few gems.
    • 53 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Going Back
    Collins takes on 18 tracks in an outing as understandable as it is unnecessary, a high-priced karaoke spin for the ersatz prog-rock-percussionist-turned-master-of-the-'80s-pop-single.
    • 53 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    The Illusion Of Progress
    One formula replaces another and another.
    • 53 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Witness
    [Witness is] more jumbled still, with would-be self-empowerment anthems next to earnest ballads lamenting the end of a relationship. ... Witness contains strong moments beyond “Chained to the Rhythm,” which still feels like the beginning of an intriguing project.
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