Rock Sound's Scores

  • Music
For 497 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 2.4 points higher than other critics. (0-100 point scale)
Average Music review score: 75
Highest review score: 100 That's the Spirit
Lowest review score: 20 Bright Black Heaven
Score distribution:
  1. Negative: 2 out of 497
497 music reviews
    • 81 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    The Baltimore hardcore crew follow up their beloved 2015 debut full-length 'Nonstop Feeling' with an equally intense 13 tracks, dragging the best elements of 20th Century punk into the modern world.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Clocking in at just under an hour across 14 songs, about 12 of which could easily be singles, Technology is engaging, fun and an early contender for album of the year, plus the album of this band’s career.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    This long-awaited second album isn’t just thrilling from start to finish: it might also be exactly what rock needs right now.
    • 59 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    This is brave, baffling, bonkers and most importantly, absolutely brilliant. Strap yourselves in, it’s a hell of a ride.
    • 70 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    It works. It all makes an album full of awesome, genuine pop-rock music. Time will tell if this album and the next couple of years propel this band to the huge rooms these songs were made for, but for now? A great band just got even better.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Despite its more slippery moments, Underworld finds Tonight Alive honing in on and owning their identity again; and given the bigger picture, taking a huge step in the right direction.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    There are strings, spoken word sections and sweeping solos, so while the themes and melodies may sound familiar, the overall tapestry rarely wears thin.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    While they continue down a more measured, accessible route--calling to mind everyone from The Clash to Rancid--there’s a freshness to the anarchy this time. Here’s a welcome beacon of hope.
    • 89 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Gut-busting, heart-wrenching and captivating from vicious beginning to devastating conclusion, the likes of ‘Cannibals’, the jolting ‘Arkhipov Calm’ and beautifully excruciating title track capture the band at their most ambitious and dominant.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Front to back, start to finish, this is pop-punk for those who have lived, loved and lost and aren’t afraid to contemplate the fact that maybe, just maybe, it isn’t going to be their weekend or their year.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Phantom Anthem is an awful lot to stomach in one sitting, but those prepared to strap in and take the ride from guttural beginnings to dramatic conclusion will be rewarded with an album of intense grandeur and unmatchable ambition.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    It all combines to make Citizen’s gloomiest, most atmospheric record yet--and also one of the most disturbing of the year so far. It’s a memorable journey.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    It’s impossible not to admire the scale and ambition of what Sleeping With Sirens are trying to achieve here, so don’t be too surprised if they’re swapping Warped Tour for arenas before too long.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    All 10 tracks here bear such scars, adding up to a staggering work of honesty, beauty and artistic achievement. It’s hugely impressive on those terms alone... but even more so given everything PVRIS endured in its creation.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Drew’s definitely been reunited with his fury again, and it feels so good.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Full of textured, wide-screen soundscapes, the record dips its feet in electronic waters, yet retains the emotional vulnerability that has always defined the Atlanta band. There’s an extra dose of sinister unease, too, especially on ‘Lead, SD’ and ‘The Moth’.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    From the barbed, Blink-182-esque pop-punk of ‘A Million Miles’ and grouchy, tongue in cheek call-outs of ‘Am I Deaf’ to sun-drenched ska numbers like ‘Don’t Let Me Go’, this is a mix of music for lounging by a pool, and tearing up a sweaty basement venue.
    • 57 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    It’s very much the work of a band who are still capable of delivering the goods even after 17 years, while showing the fresh-faced up and comers a thing or two.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    It doesn’t deviate much from the well-worn blueprint that the band have stuck to throughout their career, but when your music is this deliciously punishing why would you change?
    • 73 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    The frontman sounds great as ever, as on the powerful ‘Fabuless’ and ‘The Witness Trees’, but his usual conviction isn’t as present and the album feels largely colourless.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    At just seven tracks The Beautiful Stories is a touch slight, but whether it’s the ’80s guitar tones or quiet insistence of the quintet’s lyrics, it’ll leave a much longer impression.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    This is his new project and, unsurprisingly, it’s brilliant.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Lyrics largely consist of nostalgic references, in-jokes and arch observations, but with a bummed-out charm that invites rather than excludes. If you’ve played the classics to death and want a fresh fix, this is among the best of the new breed’s offerings.
    • 92 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    An album that will creep up on you time and time again, Two Parts Viper is more evidence that all you need to incite a riot is a guitar, drums and pure attitude.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Its delicate, sparse build-and-explode approach is largely typical of what Last Young Renegade has to offer--anthemic yet atmospheric songs that are subtly affecting.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    One of punk’s few great constants, the Chicago four-piece are back and as furious as ever with this eighth album. As you’d expect, they don’t fumble the ball.
    • 46 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Sure, the relative absence of co-frontman Mike Shinoda saps some of the band’s unique character and they get bogged down in sluggish, downcast dirges in the final stretch, but there’s also a sense of liberation running through these 10 tracks; the mark of artists unshackled from their past, stepping into the unknown.
    • 71 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Bearing the smart but dark pop hallmarks of bands like The Cure and Echo And The Bunnymen, it’s astonishing how the L.A. foursome’s fusion of disco, funk and hot gothic takes sounds so fresh in 2017, 30-odd years after that stuff’s heyday.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    There are enough special moments and poignant observations here to recommend a peek into the gloom.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    There are plenty of moments on this record where it feels like Motionless have grown into their own skin; tugging at the heartstrings one moment and cutting straight to the bone the next.