The A.V. Club's Scores

Select another publication »
For 4,544 reviews, this publication has graded:
  • 64% higher than the average critic
  • 2% same as the average critic
  • 34% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 1.5 points higher than other critics. (0-100 point scale)
Average Music review score: 74
Highest review score: 100 The Life Of Pablo
Lowest review score: 0 Graffiti
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 3,663 out of 4544
  2. Mixed: 771 out of 4544
  3. Negative: 110 out of 4544
4544 music reviews
view
per page
    • 66 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Everything Goes Wrong
    Most of their songs sound the same--warbled three-part harmonies over three-chord strumming--and the slick production only highlights that lack of breadth.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 42 Critic Score
    Ode To J. Smith
    Ode To J. Smith is the sound of a band too boxed-in to do the hooky melancholy it used to do so well, but too neutered to really rock out.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    In Waves
    New drummer Nick Augusto seems to be pushing Trivium toward a choppier and at times more primal sound, but for a band that was recently poised to evolve into something more sumptuous and ambitious, In Waves is a return to form Trivium doesn't need.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Outside
    Like a car trip across North Dakota, Outside takes a long time to get where it's going, and doesn't offer enough of interest along the way.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    The Airborne Toxic Event
    It's all perfectly competent and smoothly produced, and it's polished within an inch of its life. It's also lifeless.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Rock'n'Roll
    Way too much of Rock N Roll falls into the same trap that catches The Strokes: No matter how good a rock 'n' roll song sounds, it usually needs a certain amount of heart or heft.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Per Second, Per Second, Per Second... Every Second
    The band seems to be making a conscious effort to alienate its old fan base.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Happy People / U Saved Me
    An album that makes Up With People sound like Joy Division, Happy People embraces an ecstatic brand of cheerfulness so far removed from the realities of everyday life that it creates a kind of altered state.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Winchester Cathedral
    In and of itself, Winchester Cathedral is a fine introduction to Clinic and an entertaining 35 minutes of evocative rock. But it's hard to believe that at this late date, having been together for seven years, the band can't find new modes of musical expression.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Leave No Trace
    Leave No Trace is an enjoyable time, but the party peaks early.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Joy
    It’s barely over 30 minutes long but brims with musical ideas, including several sets of interconnected songs that push Segall and Presley to their weirdest and most tuneless.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 42 Critic Score
    This is PiL
    PiL's last album, 1992's That What Is Not, left the outfit hanging on a slick and inconsequential note, one that couldn't be further from the dubby murk of the group's pioneering work from the '70s. This Is PiL circles back to that murk, then buries its head in it.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    nyc ghosts & flowers
    But the album as a whole--which, at eight songs in 42 minutes, barely exceeds EP length--is woefully uneven, with producer Jim O'Rourke indulging the band in some truly ill-conceived whims.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    MACHINA/the machines of God
    Everything about MACHINA is capital-I Important, with virtually every element delivered in gaudy excess?
    • 66 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Triple F Life: Friends, Fans and Family
    What Triple F Life lacks in inspiration, it can sometimes compensate for with sheer sweat.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Not Animal
    It sounds like Broken Social Scene's members all broke up with their significant others and held a jam session on Saddle Creek Road. Morose, impeccably arranged, and monochromatic from start to finish, both incarnations of Animal are a perfect synthesis of indie-rock circa 2008.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Just Tell Me That You Want Me: A Tribute To Fleetwood Mac
    The tinkering these acts do with Fleetwood Mac's songs is mostly on the surface, making them sound either more electronic and alien or more old-fashioned and rootsy, without really illuminating them in any significant way.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 42 Critic Score
    The Bedlam In Goliath
    The band's frenzied rate of output seems to have trampled any inner editor, and the result is a splat of concepts and virtuosity that never coheres.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Dirty Gold
    A labored crossover grab that mistakes conviction for substance, Dirty Gold marks Haze as just the latest in a long line of promising mixtape rappers to whiff a major-label debut.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Places Like This
    In spite of Architecture In Helsinki's trademark bounce and imagination, Places feels far more like work than play.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Drukqs
    Unfortunately, most of the album's beautiful moments are cordoned off from the unbeautiful ones in ways that leave both wanting.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Octahedron
    This is a band that excels when its sing-alongs double as freak-outs; on Octahedron, they’ve largely ditched the chaos in lieu of an admirable, albeit unsatisfying, experiment in being quiet.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Echolocation
    Unfortunately, about half of the album’s 12 tracks could be described as comfortable, safe songwriting without the exploration that makes the band shine.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    I Love You, It's Cool
    The overindulgence comes off as an indistinguishable wall of sound and, even worse, as a terrific bore.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    White Knight
    Mostly, White Knight sounds like an album that was probably a lot more fun to make than it is to listen to.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    The Getaway
    The tame, disco-fried band they’ve become is the only group you’ll hear on the second half of the album, and the instrumental moments that provide redemption wear thin as Kiedis dampens their purpose.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    LANY
    LANY’s ambition is admirable—and this debut will sound great blasted at parties all summer long--but its pleasures end up feeling superficial and ephemeral.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Alone: The Home Recordings of Rivers Cuomo
    The sum of its charms--and there are a few--add up to something for only the most devoted in the Cuomo cult.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    White People
    White People has something for everyone, as well as something guaranteed to irritate or turn off everyone, whether it's undistinguished rap-metal or tiresome comedy skits that'll have less indulgent listeners reaching repeatedly for the track-skip button.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    VH1 Storytellers
    West’s performance, which focuses heavily on Heartbreak, seems to violate the entire spirit of Storytellers. He’s one of music’s great shit-talkers, but the rambling semi-stories here are disappointingly dull.
Page: