Paste Magazine's Scores

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For 4,079 reviews, this publication has graded:
  • 67% higher than the average critic
  • 3% same as the average critic
  • 30% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 3 points higher than other critics. (0-100 point scale)
Average Music review score: 76
Highest review score: 100 Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band [50th Anniversary Edition Deluxe Version]
Lowest review score: 10 Songs From Black Mountain
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 3,643 out of 4079
  2. Mixed: 400 out of 4079
  3. Negative: 36 out of 4079
4079 music reviews
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    • 64 Metascore
    • 48 Critic Score
    Rockpango
    The bad news: Los Lonely Boys are much better players than they are songwriters.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 75 Critic Score
    Art History
    All in all, Art History is a safe, solid debut effort from a band in the process of defining their sound.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 62 Critic Score
    Where the Messengers Meet
    Close-knit is fine, but on Messenger, the band has pulled themselves in too tight.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 63 Critic Score
    Battle Studies
    Mayer’s albums were maturing one after the other, combining electric blues and clever songwriting, but he takes a few steps back with the lovelorn Battle Studies, a superficial meditation on the jagged down-slope of a relationship—the romantic blitzkrieg that recalls, among other genres, his early acoustic sound on "Room for Squares."
    • 64 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Endless Wire
    The songs are mostly weird, overly familiar, or simply bland. [Dec 2006, p.89]
    • Paste Magazine
    • 63 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    There's A Fire
    Eloquently combines elements of pop, spaced-out electronic rock and even dirty garage. [Aug/Sep 2005, p.121]
    • Paste Magazine
    • 63 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Psychic Lovers
    It sounds a bit like you took Captain and Tennille (or at least Captain) and down-sampled their music, ran the vocals through a pipe organ, and then shot one of their hits (say, “Muskrat Love” or “Love Will Keep Us Together”) full of amphetamines.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 78 Critic Score
    Grapetooth
    If their aim was to respectfully recreate the soundtrack to a John Hughes movie, consider that goal met, as well. No matter their decade of influence, Grapetooth’s first album will have you dancing into the night with a glass (or bottle) of Two Buck Chuck in hand.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 75 Critic Score
    Teenage Emotions
    Yes, he’s weird and he knows it. He’s wildly successful because of it rather than in spite of it. Teenage Emotions doesn’t have a defined aesthetic and feels like Yachty is still experimenting, and his refusal to rely on formulas is commendable for a 19-year-old overnight sensation.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 62 Critic Score
    Heavy Blanket
    It's impressive, and for what it's worth, Mascis fans will dig the new effort.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 69 Critic Score
    Erotic Reruns
    What the album lacks in fine-tuning it makes up for in sheer experiential pleasure. It’s a half hour bop for the American experiment’s gradual decay.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Emoh
    Barlow fails to write an indie rock standard, something he usually manages once per album, but EMOH still exceeds expectations.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Made In China
    There's clarity visible beneath the waterline, sharp lyrics and even some hummable choruses. [Oct/Nov 2005, p.141]
    • Paste Magazine
    • 63 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Farmer's Daughter
    All in all, Farmer's Daughter is better than you might expect, which isn't to say it's great. Too many tracks aim straight for the middle.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Babel
    While the band will undoubtedly be criticized for playing it safe on the new record, there is no denying the music is solid despite its familiarity.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 61 Critic Score
    American Central Dust
    While American Central Dust falls short of "Trace's" heights, the album showcases Farrar's excellent songwriting, which is comfortingly familiar. It’s also a little monotonous.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 81 Critic Score
    The Speed of Things
    While the album bolsters the band’s brand of sound rather than showcasing any significant amount growth in writing and arrangement, The Speed of Things is an exercise in consistency and accessibility. It’s refreshing.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 57 Critic Score
    Put Your Sad Down [EP]
    Put Your Sad Down is full of great ideas--it's the execution that's often shaky.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Grace Potter & the Nocturnals
    There are hints of the band's previous life here--"Oasis" seems to strikes the roots-pop balance they're going for, and "Goodbye Kiss" is perfectly fine barroom reggae--and Potter rarely misses a chance to show off her killer voice, but The Nocturnals' crucial swagger has sadly been scrubbed clean away.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 72 Critic Score
    Drift
    With the aptly-named Drift, the band manage to find even more sounds to try, while still hitting the sonic touchstones of their most notable work.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Forget Tomorrow
    Wander[s] into engagingly curious sonic territory. [#13, p.125]
    • Paste Magazine
    • 63 Metascore
    • 66 Critic Score
    Yesterday Was Forever
    At 14 tracks, it feels pretty indulgent--only amplifying the fact that excluding a few choice cuts, these songs aren’t really all that good.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 55 Critic Score
    Purple Noon
    The chillwave movement has always channeled nostalgia—warm echoes of a distant past, faded and warped into a new aesthetic. Purple Noon, though, mostly just elicits nostalgia for the glory days of chillwave itself.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 36 Critic Score
    The Age Of Miracles
    Carpenter’s weepy soul-searching makes The Age of Miracles feel like a cheap copy of the genuine introspection that made her previous records so intriguing.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 72 Critic Score
    Beat The Devil's Tattoo
    Beat the Devil’s Tattoo finds a balance in grimy blues licks (“War Machine”), catchy hooks (“Bad Blood”) and some huge, slabs of rock (“Aya”).
    • 63 Metascore
    • 71 Critic Score
    Julian Plenti Is... Skyscraper
    Only the cloyingly celebratory 'Unwind' ranks as an unmitigated misstep, with its embarrassingly trite synth trumpet hook fitting poorly with the darker hues of the rest of the album.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 66 Critic Score
    Beauty Queen Sister
    Beauty Queen Sister will please fans that already love Indigo Girls, but the repetitive nature of the album might struggle to bring in new listeners.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Wildflower
    A collection of introspective songs that's heavy on the flower and hardly wild. [Dec 2005, p.107]
    • Paste Magazine
    • 63 Metascore
    • 69 Critic Score
    I'm with You
    All four members have referred to I'm With You as a creative rebirth. That might be a stretch. But judging by the flashes of promise, one might be waiting just around the corner.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 74 Critic Score
    Ghostbird
    Although Avi's taken a few risks with Ghostbird, the artist has still delivered a record full of material that could easily be used as the backdrop for a "stay positive" surf film--a comfortable range for the singer's talents.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 55 Critic Score
    Glow & Behold
    Glow & Behold is never shrill or musically obnoxious, but it’s obnoxious how dull it is.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    VII
    VII is Blitzen Trapper’s strongest album to date, with years of musical experimentation having come together in the band’s own mad-scientist brand of cosmic Americana.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Sun, Sun, Sun
    The kind of album that might not make year-end lists, but just might make your year. [Feb/Mar 2006, p.109]
    • Paste Magazine
    • 63 Metascore
    • 61 Critic Score
    TLC
    TLC doesn’t take any creative risks and, in doing so, ends up lukewarm and average.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Saturday Nights & Sunday Mornings
    It's only fair to consider Saturday Nights, Sunday Mornings in the context of the rest of the Crows’ catalog, and with that in mind--to borrow a phrase from Duritz--this one might fade into the grey.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 78 Critic Score
    I Am Gemini
    For Cursive fans, Gemini is best served with time, a sit-down with the liner notes and repeat listens.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Donkey
    CSS is stripped of the qualities that made it the charmingly objectionable crush of two summers ago. And note, this is not the sexy kind of stripped this time around.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 79 Critic Score
    Everything Is Borrowed
    His new record retains The Streets’ puckish charm while showing signs of maturity.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 46 Critic Score
    Not Your Kind of People
    Everything from the stilted production to Manson's lyrics to that awful album cover seems hopelessly mired in 1998.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 73 Critic Score
    Re-Mit
    Nothing about this album makes a lick of sense. If you’re a longtime obsessive fan of the group (and really there is no other kind), though, you don’t really care if it does. Like fellow prolific weirdo Jandek, it’s enough that Smith is still out there spouting off against all odds.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 61 Critic Score
    The Great Gatsby [Music from Baz Luhrmann's Film]
    The resulting collection is something more middling, neither offensive nor revolutionary, with memorable moments and forgettable ones.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 88 Critic Score
    HITnRUN: Phase Two
    The album is a call to the kind of funk that closes over your head like too much champagne. Undulating, fizzy, and almost light-headed, this is music to induce a euphoria that lifts skirts and spirits.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    The Cross Of My Calling
    Mall-punk aesthetes might be convinced, but even before Cross of My Calling’s ponderous title-track closer comes around (with its near nine-minutes of lead-footed epilogue), most listeners owning a copy of Sandinista! will have put it on instead.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Under The Iron Sea
    Keane knows its niche and plays it well. [Aug 2006, p.97]
    • Paste Magazine
    • 63 Metascore
    • 72 Critic Score
    Cee Lo's Magic Moment
    Weirdly enough, this might be Green's most immediately satisfying album as a pure soul singer; throughout, he explores the huskiest confines of his lower and middle register, instead of relying on his typical nasal fireworks.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Flavors Of Entanglement
    On some tracks, Morissette’s voice channels Björk (with whom Sigsworth has also worked), but the mood ultimately switches to watered-down Evanescence.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Paper Tigers
    It turns out that "Jerk It Out" is just the tip of the iceberg for these savvy Arctic rockers. [Aug/Sep 2005, p.130]
    • Paste Magazine
    • 63 Metascore
    • 85 Critic Score
    Time To Die
    With the drums and guitar so busy in the mix of almost every song, Keaton Snyder’s amped-up vibes are an inspired addition, their subtle atmospheric effects put to careful use by producer Phil Ek.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Drones
    In spite of its melodic clarity, Drones ultimately succumbs under the weight of its narrative, which strains for political and social commentary but winds up closer to parody.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Rehearsing My Choir
    Imaging you're listening to a radio play and let the story engage you, and you might find yourself hooked. [Dec 2005, p.108]
    • Paste Magazine
    • 62 Metascore
    • 73 Critic Score
    Youth
    In 13 songs, Wild Cub creates infectious, intricate electro-pop that blends ‘80s beats with electronics and synths worthy of the aughts.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 74 Critic Score
    Times Infinity, Vol. 2
    Despite suffering from a steady ebb and flow of musical contributors over the course of their collective career, the music still taps into a cinematic style, turning songs such as “1998” and “All the Hail Marys” into narratives full of arched drama and concerted deliberation.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Get Hurt
    It’s not the band’s greatest, most spirited or unifying; it’s not The ’59 Sound or American Slang. Rather, Get Hurt represents the exorcism and the catharsis that needed to transpire.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 72 Critic Score
    Radioactive
    Yelawolf's got personality to spare as long as it's on his own terms. Which is half the time. The rest gets by on unceasing technical skill.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 83 Critic Score
    Beacon
    Fans that loved Tourist History, prepare your mp3 player; this will be your favorite album. But if you haven't already fallen for TDCC's dance-ready, bright-voiced Irishmen, you won't find love here.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Kisses on the Bottom
    Kisses on the Bottom is a winner from beginning to end.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    The Outsider
    His work here seems scattered and gimmicky. [Oct 2006, p.75]
    • Paste Magazine
    • 62 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Yuck
    Ultimately, Yuck is more pop balladry that successfully distances itself from the seemingly defunct Aussie synth-pop movement, and that serves them well.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 49 Critic Score
    What Lasts
    Sadly, this album gets bogged down in hollow harmonies and filler songs that merely scrape the surface of emotion.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 66 Critic Score
    Lowe Country: The Songs of Nick Lowe
    The rebelliousness and playfulness promised and hoped for are glaringly absent and the listener is, unfortunately, left with a collection of songs that wouldn't sound out of place coming from the speakers of your local Starbucks.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 89 Critic Score
    Way To Normal
    This is the first album where his artistry seems fully realized, both in terms of subject matter and performance. Witty, balanced and highly charged.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    MGMT
    MGMT chokes on its own forced sense of whimsy.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    IV Play
    Even Dream’s production, which was voluptuously orchestrated, has turned static; there’s an ashen militarism to be heard in these slow, sad songs.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 77 Critic Score
    Who Am I?
    Where tracks on My Mind Makes Noises had a tendency to blend together, Who Am I? flows without becoming repetitive. Winding between melancholy ballads, poignant love songs and screamable rock anthems, the album displays a range and skill that make Pale Waves a force to be reckoned with.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 65 Critic Score
    Battle For The Sun
    The threesome, along with Tool-producer Dave Bottrill, deliver a brightly focused, 13-track collection that hard-core fans will pan and newbies will adore.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Finally Rich
    When Finally Rich works (and it often does), it's thanks to everyone other than Chief Keef.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 65 Critic Score
    Everything Matters But No One Is Listening
    Die-hard fans will love it, but for everyone else, Everything Matters But No One Is Listening probably won’t matter much at all.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Crazy Clown Time
    Crazy Clown Time, recorded in Lynch's personal studio with engineer Big Dean Hurley, isn't exactly fart-blank, but this visual master shouldn't quit his day job.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 64 Critic Score
    Born to Die
    Highly listenable pop songs that defy easy answers. The persona has its moments too.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 68 Critic Score
    Sugar
    Lame lyrics aside, Sugar demonstrates Dead Confederate's natural talent for grunge atmospherics, but they could use some songwriting workshops before tackling their third effort.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Let's Bottle Bohemia
    Let’s Bottle Bohemia is a triumph.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 84 Critic Score
    Feel That Fire
    Dierks Bentley wants to be everything to every country-music fan, and for the most part, he pulls it off.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 75 Critic Score
    Christmas In The Heart
    Musically, it’s wonderfully bad; conceptually, it’s just wonderful.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 88 Critic Score
    ...And Star Power
    Whether imitation is truly the sincerest form of flattery―and other cliches―as it pertains to this third album in the Foxygen catalog is up for debate. If it’s some secret genius, the jury is still decidedly out. Either way, you’ll want to hear this one for yourself.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 46 Critic Score
    There Are Rules
    Here the Get Up Kids sound a bit confused and rusty, making There Are Rules a late career footnote of limited urgency.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 66 Critic Score
    10,000
    No matter what speed they’re going, though, Versing all the right tools and sounds and instincts. They’re a very promising band. They just need a little more time in the oven and a little more distance from their influences. That’s the kind of thing that comes with time, and Versing has plenty of that ahead.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 82 Critic Score
    Stranger Things
    Yuck is a testament to the idea that music doesn’t need to be incredibly innovative to be original. They’re playing by the rules of catchy rock choruses as handed down by some of the more acclaimed ‘90s bands, but their confidence allows it all to sound like their own.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 30 Critic Score
    Ripe
    Granted, much of the blandness might well be attributed to producer John Alagia, who perfected the approach with the likes of Dave Matthews and John Mayer, but production aside, the songs here are just dull.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    If Songs Could Be Held
    Represents a step forward. [Oct/Nov 2005, p.139]
    • Paste Magazine
    • 62 Metascore
    • 35 Critic Score
    I Am...Sasha Fierce
    On the first disc (I Am), Knowles comes off helpless and as emotionally closed as ever....The Sasha Fierce side is more like it. Here, Knowles works her confident, fun alter-ego. Still, she overdoes it on 'Diva.'
    • 62 Metascore
    • 89 Critic Score
    Law and Order
    Law is the perfect Indian-summer morning garage sale soundtrack album. It follows the mood flow to a T.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 49 Critic Score
    Here
    Here winds up an album of originals, sung by the people who wrote them, but somehow resembling more than anything else a campfire sing-along of someone else's songs.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Eclipse
    The resulting album comes across as a natural progression, with Lewis and his Twin Shadow project reaching big and not disappointing in their grasp.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 35 Critic Score
    Indie Cindy
    What makes Indie Cindy so egregious, so much worse than a simply bad album, is how much better it could have been.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Happiness Ltd.
    Happiness ultimately falls victim to a faintly generic feel. There’s nothing we haven’t heard before, so reserve the album for background music rather than close listening, and it shouldn’t disappoint.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 65 Critic Score
    Her Loss
    The best moments come when the duo find a balance and Drake falls back on his crate-digging prowess. ... Sadly, there’s not enough of this to go around, making Her Loss another disposable Drake project that will fade away in a few weeks—one that could have been so much more.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 83 Critic Score
    Water for Your Soul
    Throughout, Stone maintains her soulful vocals without resorting to diva histrionics.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 72 Critic Score
    Paralytic Stalks
    For all its songwriterly craft, of Montreal's experiments make Paralytic Stalks one of the more compelling efforts in the band's long discography.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    In Your Dreams
    In Your Dreams is an album about exorcising the demons of the past and moving forward toward the beauty lingering in our imaginations.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Free Somehow
    While its upbeat rockers add a welcome sense of urgency, Free Somehow is most interesting when it is slow, pensive and bleak.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 76 Critic Score
    The Good Feeling Music of Dent May & His Magnificent Ukulele
    What The Good Feeling lacks in variation it makes up for with clever turns of phrase and simple, contagious melodies.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    1000 Palms
    There’s no deviating from this formula as 1000 Palms is a disappointingly reclusive step for a band whose once-bright star might have finally stopped flickering.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 53 Critic Score
    Draw The Line
    British singer/songwriter David Gray last released a proper studio album in 2005. It was called "Life in Slow Motion," and it was lovely. It was also a complete waste of that title, which could be far more accurately applied to his syrupy new LP Draw the Line.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 72 Critic Score
    Raise Vibration
    It’s this line between cheesy and unbelievably cool that Kravitz hops back and forth over throughout the album, never convincingly staying on one side. ... Worth the price of admission is “Low,” a funk-tinged easy-groover about keeping a relationship grounded. It’s sexy, it’s smooth, and it’s dance floor ready.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 78 Critic Score
    Do Things
    More of a long, leisurely ride than a bundle of cuts, Do Things is a pleasant, shiny trip.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 71 Critic Score
    Live
    A slightly lackluster recording quality on a couple of the tracks keep Ben Folds Five Live from feeling like the band’s definitive live album, despite its name, but the collection also features a few strong moments and interesting takes on both old and new songs that make it a worthwhile collector’s item, or just a nice change of pace for the casual Ben Folds fan.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 74 Critic Score
    Someday World
    Eno does his best to keep things floating on Someday World, but without a partner able to punch in the same weight class, their combined efforts end up uneven and lopsided.
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