The A.V. Club's Scores

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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
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    • 84 Metascore
    • 100 Critic Score
    Fall Be Kind [EP]
    Released at the end of a smashingly successful year, Fall Be Kind is a worthy epilogue to an all-time classic.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    MITH
    The musical spaciness only enhances his already-considerable dignity and the gravitas of his songwriting, making Mith a powerful, prophetic collection.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Gimme Fiction
    It torpedoes the often-justifiable notion that Spoon's music feels like it was made with safety in mind, and that its far-and-wide excursions are just that--temporary steps away from a safe, solid path.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Feels
    A carefully sequenced, fully imagined album--one that's designed to be consumed by people wearing headphones and staring into space.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 67 Critic Score
    Western Stars
    It’s a delight to hear the man summon the musical spirits of his past, but it’s all a bit overly tasteful and mannered to have the force as his usual work.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Yeezus
    “Harder, better, faster, stronger”: It was years ago that West first took to that mantra, but it’s on the visceral, unrelenting Yeezus that he fully internalizes it.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 75 Critic Score
    Wildheart
    Wildheart sees Miguel expanding and refining his sound, and while not every experiment hits its mark, the result is an ambitious and moving album.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 83 Critic Score
    Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga
    Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga is more scattershot, as though Daniel weren't sure whether he wanted to make his big pop push, keep pursuing rhythmic deconstruction to its logical end, or just give up entirely and make "A Series Of Sneaks" again.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Hope Downs
    Hope Downs more than delivers on the promise of the Melbourne quintet’s two early EPs, doubling down on the melancholy pop it forged on 2015’s Talk Tight and last year’s The French Press while also polishing its sound.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Sometimes the Blues is Just a Passing Bird
    A fine melodicist, Matsson quiets his fiery side on the Sometimes The Blues Is Just A Passing Bird EP, but even when he's going the delicately pretty route, his songs aspire to greater heights.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Takk...
    So, while it's easy to imagine most of the songs on Takk... sitting comfortably on previous albums, the ebb and flow would be damagingly disrupted if any of the 11 tracks were moved around, omitted, or added to.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    MCII
    When artists soften with time, their music often loses some of its appeal; rarely does a songwriter nail his voice as successfully as Cronin has here.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Blood Money
    At times it almost seems like a conscious attempt to strip away the romantic veneer with which Alice covered its "closed-down cabaret," finding only insanity and sadness amongst the dust and bones.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    The Black Album
    It's essentially The Blueprint 3.0.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    The Worse Things Get, the Harder I Fight, the Harder I Fight, the More I Love You
    An album of songs that seem to be about love and loss but never quite connect emotionally, almost as though Case is so wrapped up in seeming ladylike that she never really remembers to let go.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 83 Critic Score
    Burn Your Fire for No Witness
    Angel Olsen's volatile voice lends an undercurrent of real, immediate danger to the early garage-rock throwbacks of Burn Your Fire For No Witness.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 75 Critic Score
    Invasion of Privacy
    Cardi B got here by rapping her face off, and on Invasion Of Privacy, she determines to stay here by doing it for--well, nine more tracks. So far, so good.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 100 Critic Score
    Singularity
    There’s no prescribed narrative, but Singularity still tells a grand story--a synesthetic evocation of how it feels to be alive.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Living for a Song: A Tribute to Hank Cochran
    The arrangements are warm and understated while the performances fill the room, making Living For A Song a steady grower that sneaks up behind listeners and pickpockets their hearts.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 83 Critic Score
    Sparkle Hard
    Sparkle Hard is Malkmus at his most compelling: balancing his experimental whims while revealing pieces of his arcane heart.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 100 Critic Score
    The Crane Wife
    The songs brim with melodic ideas, but the album never overwhelms, because Meloy doesn't try to pack every minute with words and hooks.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Extraordinary Machine
    It's another solid set of passionate, angry, marvelously produced songs delivered by a singular voice, and it succeeds by following a muse that doesn't just ignore genre distinctions and pop delineations—it doesn't know they exist.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 83 Critic Score
    All Nerve
    On the whole, All Nerve is a strong, clear-eyed return for Dayton, Ohio’s ’90s alt-rock icons.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 83 Critic Score
    Hey What
    More successfully than on Double Negative, Low has fused the thesis and antithesis of its musical identity, creating a transcendent synthesis of its fragile, beautiful ego and raging experimental id. Lucky 13, indeed.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    The Pretty Toney Album
    Though his rhyming Wu-Tang compatriots are conspicuously absent, Ghostface's latest does what nearly all latter-day Wu-Tang releases have been trying to do without much success: return to the brilliance of 36 Chambers. [28 Apr 2004]
    • The A.V. Club
    • 84 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    The Beginning Stages Of...
    Though he could stand to loosen the reins and let his sidemen push the songs into more adventurous territory, DeLaughter has at least figured out how to create a dramatic effect.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots
    Endlessly listenable and almost invariably mesmerizing, Yoshimi Battles The Pink Robots piles on layers of production prowess without drowning out the beat of its human, humane heart.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Bittersweet
    Throughout the album, Chambers displays a remarkable ability to weave sharp wit with lyrics that touch on loss and desperation.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 100 Critic Score
    Negro Swan
    He’s given us not just a great album, but a piece of himself that stands as a whole truth that need not be escaped, but rather, treasured.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 75 Critic Score
    Cuz I Love You
    Perhaps the most striking thing about Cuz I Love You is its vulnerability.
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