Slant Magazine's Scores

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For 3,121 reviews, this publication has graded:
  • 35% higher than the average critic
  • 3% same as the average critic
  • 62% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 7.7 points lower than other critics. (0-100 point scale)
Average Music review score: 65
Highest review score: 100 Who Kill
Lowest review score: 0 Fireflies
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 1,691 out of 3121
  2. Mixed: 1,319 out of 3121
  3. Negative: 111 out of 3121
3121 music reviews
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per page
    • 74 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    I'll Never Get Out of This World Alive
    If not at his absolute peak, I'll Never Get Out of This World Alive is still easily the best album he's recorded since Bill Clinton left office.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Dereconstructed
    Dereconstructed sounds like a continually exploding bombshell.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    The Deaner Album
    His technical skill and workmanlike approach to grimy, delightfully vulgar subject matter is on full display here.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    We All Want the Same Things
    We All Want the Same Things is cut from the same cloth as everything Finn's done before as an artist, but it isn't quite fair to call it more of the same. The way an album feels matters, and this one feels comfortable--and self-possessed in a way that his other solo albums aren't.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Shaolin vs. Wu-Tang
    By attempting to break free from his group's guru, Raekwon inevitably only proves how vital RZA has been to nearly everything its members have produced, and how Raekwon has been unable to break free from his influence.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Caracal
    If Settle was the thunderstorm, Caracal is the unmistakable scent left in the air afterward.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Putrifiers II
    The music here never has too clear of an antecedent, and the directions the album takes are generally unexpected-unsurprising for a band with such fondness for the unusual.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    The Long Shadow of the Paper Tiger
    Long Shadow of the Paper Tiger is likely the most unabashedly fun album since Caribou's Swim, which played with the connection between organic and electronic elements the same way that Mahjongg here toys with everything, viewing familiar sounds as plastic trinkets: things to be picked up, shaken around, and then tossed away.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Long Line of Heartaches
    Long Line of Heartaches should earn her a place alongside genre vets like Loretta Lynn and Johnny Cash, whose late-career albums have ranked among their strongest work.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Making a New World
    An ambitious concept album about the aftermath of World War I. Even if you don’t feel the need to follow along with their historical lyrics, these 19 short songs are an entertaining, unpredictable listen.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Crazy Itch Radio
    Crazy Itch Radio's not the Sign O' The Times that Rooty fans have been waiting for, but it's a more-than-serviceable Lovesexy.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    WE
    The melodies and arrangements here are as excellent as they are predictable, and the band recaptures their classic sound on “The Lightning I, II,” with a comfortingly familiar blend of wide-open-skies Springsteen/U2 bombast and pour-out-your-heart emotionalism. But at times, especially toward the beginning of the album, WE takes a more tentative approach.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Stuff Like That There
    Yo La Tengo manages to further their transparency and place the focus even more on the material, faking their way through another series of delicately adjusted, quietly exquisite reinterpretations.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Highway Companion
    These 12 often-elegiac tracks are machine-shop sleek, effortlessly buffed to a precision gloss that buoys Petty's irresistible harmonies and layered compositions.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    The Wack Album
    Despite its occasional lapses into overly familiar territory, The Wack Album proves there simply isn't anyone out there who executes this strain of musical comedy with as much satirical precision as the Lonely Island.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Rated O
    Spread out over three discs for maximum inefficiency, Oneida's Rated O seems to thrive on its own difficulty, both in sprawling presentation and a strident, noisy sense of sonic resistance.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Butterfly House
    This is without doubt the band's most mature work to date, and perhaps they're most polished too, thanks to some excellent production work, but Butterfly House still has no respect for convention and shows little interest in becoming a straightforward pop record.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Magic
    I'll grant you that Magic is uneven, but I cannot admit that it is anything other than constantly captivating.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Personality (One Was A Spider, One Was A Bird)
    The Sleepy Jackson are an oddball treat for those who want their pop music to color outside the lines.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Dark Night Of The Soul
    Albums like this are a reminder that we've perhaps lost something in the digital age. If it's true that we're the ones fumbling in the dark with rain falling over our heads, Dark Night is, at the very least, one bright ray of hope.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Last Night All My Dreams Came True
    It pulls off the neat trick of wrapping up their legacy while also adding something new to it.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Unreal
    When it succeeds, the album achieves a kind of weightless beauty above and beyond anything else in the Londoner's repertoire, and even the relative failures display the kind of ambition to suggest that his decision to leave Yuck was justifiable.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    What We Saw from the Cheap Seats
    At her best, Spektor tempers her theatrics with a deep-seated empathy. Beneath the yelps, gasps, and exaggerated accents, she's a romantic, and What We Saw is her most deeply felt, resonant work to date.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Wrapped in Red
    Any of these, as well as the retro title track, would make welcome additions to shopping-mall playlists, but it's the album's lead single, "Underneath the Tree," which recalls Mariah Carey's "All I Want for Christmas Is You" in theme, tone, and structure, that's likely to become Clarkson's very own contemporary standard.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Libra Scale
    Libra Scale is a tighter, more sophisticated and compelling album that borrows not just MJ's swoony-smooth melodies, but also his taste for roleplay.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Love Is Free [EP]
    Love Is Free feels comparatively tossed off, merely a bridge between Robyn 2.0 and an incarnation of the dance-pop icon we--and she--haven't yet imagined.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Get Guilty
    Yet all of this feels like quibbling when surveying an album that's still devastatingly charming, consistently intelligent, and engaging on first listen.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Uptown Special
    Stax-style guitar figures and bass walks undergird most of the songs, yet Chabon's peculiar imagery and Ronson's use of the occasional drum machine and synthesizer keep Uptown Special from sounding either like an earnestly literary concept album or a kitschy imitation of Ronson's favorite records from the not so distant past.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    The January EP
    With The January EP, Here We Go Magic has found a way to mature their sound without abandoning its core elements.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Knuckleball Express
    Knuckleball Express may well be the most accessible entry in the musician’s vast catalogue. It’s not a compromise or sell-out, but rather a welcome implementation of his talents to the foundational rock that’s always undergirded his sound and sensibility.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Radical Optimism
    Despite their short runtimes, though, many of these songs still pack an undeniable punch, thanks in large part to Parker and Harle’s meticulous production.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Regions of Light and Sound of God
    There's a certain variety to the approach here, but it coheres for the most part on James's insistently tuneful interrogation of himself. He remains a smart commentator on the voyeuristic elements of attraction.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    The Light of the Sun
    Scott has reasserted herself as a relevant voice in modern R&B, a voice imbued with the sort of sensuality and worldliness that arrives only with experience, and she proves she's just as willing to experiment as her younger competition.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Paracosm
    Paracosm is essentially a travelogue, albeit wrinkled, scuffed, and faded so as to match the love-worn tastes of its creator.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    All We Grow
    Carey almost certainly has a better album in him, but as a 40-minute introduction to the man behind the drumkit, this one is an assured and undemanding success.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Cansei De Ser Sexy
    There's not a song on the album that isn't catchy as all hell, but there are times when CSS... sound like Cibo Matto performing covers of The Shaggs.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Static
    Whereas Cults' debut was more carefree in its breezy melodies, Static has a heavier heart, presenting a band with not only a better understanding of their music, but of each other as human beings.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Car Alarm
    Sam Prekop and company serve up their characteristic concoction of jazzy rhythms, softhearted melodies and crystal-clear production aesthetics on Car Alarm, a record equally appropriate to romantic afternoons and late-night drink-offs.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    The Information
    His latest album plays like a subdued collection of greatest hits, dropping in on the sounds and themes of each preceding album with graceful brevity.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Ten Songs from Live at Carnegie Hall
    There may not be many surprises musically on Ten Songs, but it's surprising enough that Adams has let the façade down and finally let us hear his music in its purest form.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Instinct
    Flourishes like the instrumental outro on "Last Night" and the shifting tempos of "The Fox" speak to the duo's willingness to experiment with tone and rhythm in ways that are forward-thinking without being labored or self-indulgent.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Heroes & Villains
    As a concept album about good and evil, Heroes & Villains mostly delivers. It’s not very ambitious as far as subject matter goes, but the majority of the guests, whose appearances never feel obligatory, at least cursorily touch on the central theme. ... To this end, Metro seems more like an orchestrator or curator. Unlike Khaled, however, Metro aims for a unified sound, and damned if he doesn’t achieve it.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Invitation
    There isn't a moment on Invitation where it sounds like they aren't having fun, and their good time spills over into a dozen songs that are textured, tuneful, and immediate,
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Shulamith
    Shulamith is a much more cohesive and self-assured effort [than its debut].
    • 73 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Interpretations: The British Rock Songbook
    Divine intervention aside, it's a matter of the unparalleled depth of LaVette's interpretive skill that she can take a covers album and make it sound like a collection of originals.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    A Christmas Cornucopia
    After almost a dozen similarly classic melodies being reworked so thoughtfully, the album's sole original-and secular-composition, the borderline-soft-rock "Universal Child," sounds remarkably bland, like a Yuletide "We Are the World." Still, Lennox seems more inspired on A Christmas Cornucopia than she has in years.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    The Competition
    The Competition uses the aesthetics of the ‘80s dance floor to try to understand the rising tide of global nationalism. That makes it an easy listen despite its divisive subject matter.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Dear Life
    Ultimately, Benson’s impeccable melodic instincts justify Dear Life’s largely featherweight tone.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Shifty Adventures in Nookie Wood
    The world Cale has created here is conflicted and weird, but it's also fascinating.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    High Road
    Those mottled sounds make High Road Kesha’s least consistent album to date, at least sonically. But there’s a clear emotional through line. ... With High Road, Kesha has found a way to double back and carve out a comfortable, if not happy, middle ground.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Meaning of Life
    Meaning of Life doesn't reinvent the genre, nor does it try to, but it portrays an artist continuing to redefine herself—in the process, solidifying her position as one of her generation's greatest singers.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Holidaydream: Sounds of the Holidays, Vol. 1
    The musical ideas on Holidaydream are notably original. They float with delicacy, leaving an impression like a snow angel-precious, a little sad, and bound to fade all too quickly.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Tapes
    Even if the Rapture really hasn't made much music that sounds like this (their rockist tendencies generally get the better of them), it's nice to know that they're in touch with this fact.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    The Weight Is A Gift
    The electric guitars are grittier and the drums are more aggressive than those of many of their fellow indie-pop acts, giving Nada Surf a distinctive sound in an increasingly crowded genre and rocking hard enough that they rightfully should earn a second shot at radio.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Sky Blue Sky
    Though it may not fit comfortably alongside any other albums in Wilco's catalogue, Sky Blue Sky is further confirmation that, even at their most retro, they're among contemporary pop music's most vital acts.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Devotion
    Devotion includes all of the same essential ingredients as its predecessor, but a ratcheting-up of intensity makes this album shine even brighter.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Fading Trails
    Fading Trails shows he's capable of being a striking indie-rock personality.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Welcome To Sideways
    A contoured album that hits a sweet spot between kinetic and laidback.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    The Triad
    Pantha remains less interested in constructivist concept pieces than interlinked studies riffing on a consistent theme, in which naturalistic splendor is conveyed by the interplay between thumping dynamism and sedate tranquility.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Marauder
    These measured musical and lyrical tangents complement more than contrast the album's thematic focus on reckless impulsivity. Rather than simply dwelling on the potential for ruin, the band acknowledges the euphoria that can greet those who follow their whims, resulting in an album that crackles with the energy of embracing life's unpredictable turns.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Wu-Massacre
    It goes without saying that Wu-Massacre is reliant on the superb chemistry between Meth, Ghost, and Rae though. The beats are decent, the guest spots are passable, but it's those three names on the cover that steal the show.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Knives Don't Have Your Back
    Knives Don't Have Your Back is a striking contrast--and a poignant, subtle companion--to last year's Live It Out.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Do Whatever You Want All the Time
    Do Whatever You Want All the Time is a candy-colored descent into madness, one which tames the wildness of the group's previous efforts in the interest of a far more mature style.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Lazers Never Die
    The remixed versions of the songs from Guns Don't Kill People all demonstrate an intuitive understanding of what worked about those songs in their original forms, while the new songs continue in Major Lazer's exploration of the sounds found on nearly every dance floor in the world's tropical climates.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    I'm Gay (I'm Happy)
    I'm Gay (I'm Happy) isn't sly and intertextual, it's an alternate universe beholden only to its own laws.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    The Feast of the Broken Heart
    While Butler has for the most part an uncanny ability to match singer to material, his own personal lyrical touch is left slightly remote (he co-wrote many of the songs with his collaborators). Instead, he's a curator par excellence who's once again assembled an aggressive and varied collection of voices who together form an earnest plea to choose compassion over division.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Gossip In The Grain
    Gossip in the Grain clearly shows he can do more than the typical singer-songwriter navel gazing.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Desperate Ground
    What stops Desperate Ground from eclipsing the Thermals' best work is its periodical monotony.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    The BQE
    His ideas are realized with the confidence of a seasoned composer, comfortable with implementing all corners of the orchestra to wondrous effect.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    4
    It's certainly going to dilate the cervixes of the demographic among B's fanbase who can't hold it in whenever she howls out a slow-burning torch song. In 46 minutes and 12 tracks, 4 suggests a full-term nine months.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Distant Relatives
    It feels almost vain to describe individual tracks, because every last note on Distant Relatives blends to form a seamless, cohesive whole.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Pour Une Âme Souveraine: A Dedication to Nina Simone
    Pour Une Âme Souveraine both honors Simone's legacy while allowing Ndegeocello to build on her own.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Call Me Crazy
    Crazy is confused and conflicted. Taken in the context of Womack's career as a whole, however, it's fairly representative of how she has vacillated between sterling, smart traditional cuts like 'The Fool' and 'Does My Ring Burn Your Finger' and vapid Faith Hill knockoffs like 'Something Worth Leaving Behind' and 'Why They Call It Falling.'
    • 73 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Still
    Even as de Casier explores the experience of uncertainty, she exhibits confidence in her identity as a singularly detail-oriented artist.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Ullages
    Eagulls are also gloomier, swapping the punk-rock call-and-response style of their debut for a more reflective kind of musical angst. But Ullages's best tracks are the most energetic.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Decemberunderground
    Both accessible and artistic, Decemberunderground is destined to give AFI that larger mainstream audience they missed out on the last time around.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Ready for Confetti
    In dropping the irony for a moment, Keen yet again toys with expectations and shakes up his formula, and it's that openness to change that makes Ready for Confetti one of Keen's finest albums.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Blakroc
    Without a doubt, Blakroc can be considered a gamble that has most certainly paid off; this is the most credible fusion of the two genres in a long, long while.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    God Willin' & the Creek Don't Rise
    Since the album finds LaMontagne working without producer and multi-instrumentalist Ethan Johns for the first time, it isn't terribly surprising that the singer is a bit unsteady in taking the reins. Still, it's the things that LaMontagne gets right on God Willin' & the Creek Don't Rise that make it his strongest, most cohesive album to date and a deeply soulful take on contemporary blues and folk.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Descended Like Vultures
    If not as easy to embrace as its predecessor, the album compensates with a great deal more ambition in its scope.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Light Chasers
    For an album that's set in the coldness of space, Light Chasers impresses for its warmth.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    The Excitement of Maybe
    With terrific work from drummer Brady Blade and bassist Christian McBride, the record emphasizes rhythm in a way that's uncommon for the generally stuffy Americana scene. And The Excitement of Maybe works because Cervenka, like a true punk, deliberately defies conventions.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Dixie Lullabies
    Drive-By Truckers may have all of the indie cred, but Dixie Lullabies is a welcome reminder that Kentucky Headhunters are still one of the finest Southern-rock outfits around.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    The Hunger Games: Songs from District 12 and Beyond
    They consistently hit on the themes that have made The Hunger Games such a broadly appealing and resonant work, making for a soundtrack that reflects favorably on the film and which stands entirely on its own merits.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Dance Again...The Hits
    The quality of the material on Dance Again varies ... but it's clear much of the blame for Lopez's disappearance from the pop charts prior to "On the Floor" was a precipitous decline in quality that began with 2005's irritating "Get Right."
    • 72 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Mala
    Mala attests to a discipline that was absent in Banhart's recent, loopier ventures, proving that his eccentric songwriting works best when harnessed in service of good storytelling.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Energy
    Energy demands your attention with inviting, joyous beats and its vocalists’ direct appeals.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    DISCO
    While the album might be a purely derivative work, its period arrangements—all sweeping disco strings, Nile Rodgers-esque guitar licks, and indiscriminately deployed cowbell—are executed with aplomb.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Dreamer
    Although Iqbal demonstrates a profound understanding of genre and influences, Dreamer occasionally only dabbles in these styles rather than fully immerses itself in them. ... Nevertheless, Iqbal’s prowess as a singer and songwriter shines through with richness and depth.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Aabenbaringen Over Aaskammen
    Aabenbaringen Over Aaskammen's most vital resource is Casiokids' boundless sense of playfulness, which enables them to effortlessly blend the familiar with the transgressive.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Turn Blue
    There's still a two-man garage band in there, but Auerbach and Patrick Carney are currently catering to earbuds rather than stadiums.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Voyageur
    Voyageur makes for a captivating, thrilling descent into loneliness and misery.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Release The Stars
    It feels more like a collection of tracks than a cohesive work.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Mantaray
    Mantaray's sound is distinctly modern, filtered through the lush electronic textures of Garbage, Portishead, even Björk, but it's Siouxsie voice--trembling and echoing all at once--that reaffirms the album's urgency.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    BlackenedWhite
    The duo strikes a fine working relationship throughout BlackenedWhite too, with Left ensuring his colleague's standout bars are accentuated with a quirky sample or a sudden key change. In all, this is a far more accessible affair than Goblin; it never comes close to being as downright offensive, and Hodgy's breezy flow helps make this a far easier album to digest.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    The Recession
    There's a unique pleasure in hearing a once one-dimensional rapper discover complexity, and for that Recession is nearly indispensable.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    I Disagree
    I Disagree is decidedly “post-genre,” tossing Poppy’s pop aesthetic into the shredder with heavy metal and industrial rock, previously only hinted at on the tail end of 2018’s Am I a Girl? “Concrete” shifts abruptly between tempos and genres, between commercial jingles and Beatles-esque chamber-pop, all shot through with roaring electric guitar riffs. That might sound incoherent, but it serves as a bold, deftly executed mission statement.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 100 Critic Score
    Pixel Revolt
    It fully merits high praise as both the best work of Vanderslice's career and easily one of the best albums of what has been a refreshingly strong year for music.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Viva La Vida
    Coldplay have come up with the rare major-label pop record that stands to move a ton of copies even as it's at least a little bit challenging to its primary audience.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Romanian Names
    Something of a letdown by his own lofty standards, but still awfully good by anyone else's, John Vanderslice's Romanian Names is perhaps the singer-songwriter's most obtuse album.
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