Sputnikmusic's Scores

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For 2,395 reviews, this publication has graded:
  • 53% higher than the average critic
  • 2% same as the average critic
  • 45% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 1.3 points lower than other critics. (0-100 point scale)
Average Music review score: 72
Highest review score: 100 The Seer
Lowest review score: 10 The Path of Totality
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 1,773 out of 2395
  2. Mixed: 543 out of 2395
  3. Negative: 79 out of 2395
2395 music reviews
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    • 74 Metascore
    • 68 Critic Score
    Individ
    For all its technical skill, though, this focus inward makes for a circular listening experience, at least for long time listeners of the band. It’s difficult to feel like this is ground that hasn’t been traversed before, and just as well.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 68 Critic Score
    Back in Black
    This latest effort is an unabashed classic hip hop record for you to either take it or leave it. The only disappointment is that it could have easily been more than this.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 68 Critic Score
    Tonic Immobility
    It’s a competent album, fun and succinct enough for a worthwhile playthrough but too full of yesterday’s novelty to shrug off the why here? why now? concerns destined to orbit any comeback record. Individual listeners will find their own ways to make peace with this, but I struggle to view it as more than a back-to-basics top-up from an act that had very little to prove. Blessed and cursed with a handful of the most talented names in rock, it’s equal parts a welcome return and a missed opportunity.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 68 Critic Score
    Fuse
    Fuse lands as a welcome sampler of the Everything But the Girl sound updated to the ‘20s, but not quite the powerhouse comeback they are so clearly capable of.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 68 Critic Score
    Pacific Daydream
    Pacific Daydream is pretty much just fine--34 minutes of unambiguous, catchy music, competent enough to land on the good side of Weezer's discography without reaching for anything more.
    • 68 Metascore
    • 68 Critic Score
    Conduit
    Ultimately, Conduit is a fair step down from the resurgence that was Welcome Home Armageddon. But having said that, it remains a solid addition to their discography.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 68 Critic Score
    Dedicated
    Dedicated is good, but it doesn’t whirl with the same destructive force; in that sense, it is Carly Rae’s first genuine failure in a decade.
    • 71 Metascore
    • 68 Critic Score
    Wrong Creatures
    Wrong Creatures is an often somber listen, better done at night. It isn’t Black Rebel Motorcycle Club at their peak, although it shows the three seasoned musicians doing a good job in their own field.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 68 Critic Score
    The Waterfall
    There’s some reassurance in that many of the more aimless songs sound like they would translate far better to the band’s true home on the stage, but here they qualify more as two-dimensional portraits.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 68 Critic Score
    No Man's Land
    The album is far from perfect, but it is still temping to describe it as a welcome return to form for a songwriter who has lately ventured closer to fluffy indie-pop than the biting folk that made his name. The best of the songs on No Man’s Land mix dense historiography with accessible catchiness.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 68 Critic Score
    The Art of Survival
    The Art of Survival picks up where The Kingdom left off, but it doubles down on the sludgy, heavier, direction of its predecessor while dumping most the alt rock influences. What’s more, in this era where heavy music is the norm, Bush almost sounds fresh because there’s very few artists blending grungy heaviness with a more accessible songwriting formula.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 68 Critic Score
    Moral Hygiene
    About two-thirds of Moral Hygiene is good and there are no tragic moments at all. In essence, the LP brings together most of what Ministry explored during the last three decades. The results are not stellar, but Jourgensen found a balance again between getting his point across and focusing on diversifying the music.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 68 Critic Score
    333
    All told, 333’s latter two-thirds are full of similar highlights, individually enjoyable but somewhat piecemeal as a collection. It’s full of threads that almost come together and, more importantly, a generous swathe of playlist fodder, but I can’t say I’m a huge fan of having three semi-distinct aftertastes in my mouth at the same time. Tinashe’s voice is impressive throughout, even if some songs don’t allow for the most engaging performances.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 68 Critic Score
    Rockmaker
    The group tried something different here and it really works. Overall, ROCKMAKER stands as one of the group’s most cohesive LPs in a long time, automatically making it easier to follow through and digest.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 66 Critic Score
    Haiku from Zero
    The record’s energy is impressive; the craft, even more so. What it doesn’t have, though, is any sense of vision, nothing of that dangerous excess or discovery that the best Cut Copy provides in spades. Instead, Haiku From Zero ends up being a bunch of great songs and little else.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 66 Critic Score
    Zipper Down
    Although the new album is a solid affair and a step up in tightness/structure, it needed that previous edge to be truly compelling.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 66 Critic Score
    Desperate Ground
    It’s a loud and brash album, but too often, that’s all it is.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 66 Critic Score
    Once Twice Melody
    Legrand weaves a series of intersecting narratives of love and loneliness, intimacy and abandonment, maturity and nostalgia. Any one of these themes is rich enough to fuel far more than Once Twice Melody’s eighty-five minutes, but Beach House’s storytelling is defocused to the point of indistinction, strung out of moody vignettes that flow like asphalt and stick like the tide. ... Fortunately for us all, this is just too gorgeous a record to pose a true slog.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 66 Critic Score
    Habitual Levitations: Instilling Words with Tones
    The instrumentation at hand is stellarly crafted, the riffs are infectious and most of the album as a whole is certainly on par with the band’s discography. Yet Intronaut’s most blatant change--foregoing harsh vocals, and only utilizing singing--is a decision that severely dampens the group’s fourth studio outing.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 66 Critic Score
    Mr. Morale & The Big Steppers
    The listening experience is defined by languorous stretches between big moments, and becomes more of an exercise in patience than an engaging and enlivening journey. If it were more cohesive, more palpably moving in a musical sense, had less fat to trim, I could see myself fawning over Mr. Morale & The Big Steppers in fanboyish frenzy. As it stands, I think that in another five years I'll be wading back through this flawed masterpiece.
    • 71 Metascore
    • 66 Critic Score
    Half of Where You Live
    While Half Of Where You Live is structured remarkably well, its definitive moments lack that particular magnetism that’s always been at the heart of Gold Panda’s music.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 66 Critic Score
    Endless Rooms
    Endless Rooms has the feel of a transition album, with the group throwing some new ideas at the wall and seeing what sticks. There’s several new sounds and influences present on Endless Rooms which present intriguing and viable routes for RBCF to pursue on their eventual fourth record. The future is uncertain, but hope springs eternal.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 66 Critic Score
    Lover
    On an album this long, there is equal room for good and bad, and you’re always equidistant from either one no matter what track you’ve reached.
    • 70 Metascore
    • 66 Critic Score
    ...And Then You Shoot Your Cousin
    It’s still a strong album with several standout moments, but these great moments are often hampered by the inchoate themes and parched ideas surrounding it, making the album feel at times unfinished.
    • 75 Metascore
    • 66 Critic Score
    Government Plates
    The result is a sometimes great, sometimes merely serviceable album which can stand among Death Grips’ ample discography, despite occasionally sacrificing melody for amplified pandemonium.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 66 Critic Score
    Just Like You
    The best Falling in Reverse songs, with rare exception, are the ones where Ronnie sounds like he's struggling to keep up with the song's pace.... The weakest songs on the album are, again, easily written-off as the band falling into familiar traps.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 66 Critic Score
    Common as Light and Love Are Red Valleys of Blood
    As a writer of the English language, Kozelek gets perfect marks; as a writer of songs, the jury is still out.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 66 Critic Score
    Purge
    At the end of the day, Purge is Godflesh doing Godflesh and doing a good job at it, but as far as how it stacks up against the rest of their discography, it’s far from a high point.
    • 59 Metascore
    • 66 Critic Score
    Sequel to the Prequel
    So why does every record feel like a Year Zero? It’s because each release comes with a caveat; that being “could do better”.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 66 Critic Score
    Holy Moly!
    At the end of the day, how one perceives Holy Moly! depends on whether they’re a glass half-empty or half-full type of person. On one hand, sound-wise, this feels like a step towards the right direction. On the other hand, Blues Pills are kinda like the 2005-06 LA Lakers; replace Kobe with Stephen Jackson, or another decent shooting guard, and what you have is a 20-win team instead of a playoff seed. Similarly, replace Elin with another decent vocalist, and chances are that we wouldn’t be talking about Holy Moly! right now.
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