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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    • 79 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Soldier Of Love
    Soldier benefits from a divine sense of intimacy; Sade seems to be whispering secret thoughts directly into the listener’s ears.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    You In Reverse
    This is a real, classic rock 'n' roll record, with powerhouse production backing a set of songs that actively engage.
    • 75 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Hospitality
    Hospitality is a sharp, well-rehearsed guitar-pop collection.
    • 93 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Dolly
    The bulk of Dolly comes from the professionally tumultuous, creatively astounding period from the mid-’60s through the Wagoner split.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Gentle Stream
    The Amazing like to entice and then awe, always bringing songs back to the guitars, which sound like they're being played by a real human person, until they burst into shards of jagged, whirling rainbows.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    The Airing Of Grievances
    With its brash and boiling-over debut, Titus Andronicus has done its small part to draw indie-rock out of the genre's recent navel-obsessed slump.
    • 71 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    CHUCK
    Chuck’s a wonderful piece of American music, and ultimately as enigmatic and elusive as the man who filed it on his way out the door.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Nocturnal Koreans
    Fifteen albums into its career, the band has never sounded more ready to rip up its playbook and forge ahead into new territory.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Sainthood
    It’s another inside-out move for Tegan & Sara; they’ve pulled apart self-doubt and found the self-regard that lines it.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Future Women
    Ultimately, Future Women's fractured personality gives the album drama.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    The Things We Do To Find People Who Feel Like Us
    It’s across 10 immaculately tidy tracks, and if Snyder’s goal is to get the band’s points across and accomplish that feeling of catharsis all the same, then this record sure feels like a success.
    • 87 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    CTRL
    Ctrl is as tough as Damn is tender, and it knocks as hard as The Sun’s Tirade swoons.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    I Learned The Hard Way
    When the puttering “Better Things” opens with cocktail chatter and a snappy trumpet solo, I Learned The Hard Way brings back the days of working-class pop stars in three-piece suits, crafting songs so catchy that they had to be allowed into the club.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Teens of Style
    Those familiar with Toledo’s back catalog will marvel at the reworking of their favorite tracks, while the uninitiated will likely discover a bright young talent and wonder how the hell they’ve been missing out.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Lost Songs
    With Lost Songs, it's rekindled the raw, unflinching spirit that, a decade ago, placed the group among rock's elite.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    I Am What I Am
    Haggard began his career as a badass, but I Am is blessed with the humility and grace of a legend at peace with himself and the world around him.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    II
    Because of its obsession with rhythm, II is at once more accessible and more overpowering than the average instrumental record. Each repetition brings an ambush, and a renewal.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Sometimes I Wish We Were An Eagle
    What makes Eagle so strong is that the music stayed light, and those bucolic splashes of washed-out color contrast so well against Bill Callahan’s blues.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Deerhoof Vs. Evil
    On this, the group's most consistently engaging album in years, pretty much every one of those ideas works.
    • 75 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    25
    Her music feels authentic because, as a listener, you believe that these songs about love, pain, fear, and loss come from somewhere real and personal. On 25, she once again has something to say, with a voice that demands to be heard.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Cease To Begin
    Cease To Begin, doesn't deviate much from its excellent 2006 debut, "Everything All The Time," the record's relaxed, understated grace is distinctively Southern in its lack of self-consciousness.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Yesterday And Today
    Though it’s on par with its predecessor in terms of repetition, Yesterday And Today is also on that level in terms of quality--which should mean no disappointments.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Age Of
    The result is a remarkably accessible, yet still resolutely avant-garde work, with Lopatin taking various musical forms--cough-syrupy R&B jams, country ballads, baroque chamber pop--and wresting unexpected nuances out of them, the same way he does that harpsichord.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Hot Sauce Committee, Pt. 2
    This is the music Beastie Boys love whether it's trendy or not. Three decades in, they continue to school the kids.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Option Paralysis
    With Option Paralysis, Dillinger stops to catch its breath--if you can really call it that--but the result is no less stunning.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Kaputt
    Kaputt rolls luxuriously in its own plush soft-rock grandeur, powerfully alluring and deeply sad at the same time.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Your Future Our Clutter
    The band is in one of its ever-cyclical upswings, bolstered by what Smith has referred to as "the best lineup I've ever had"-and while a characteristically ungrateful slight against all the great Fall permutations he's sacked, it's also a fair appraisal of this season's squad.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Older Than My Old Man Now
    It's an exquisitely bittersweet meander through Wainwright's cobweb-strewn psyche liable to leave listeners laughing through tears and crying through laughter.
    • 70 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    This Addiction
    This Addiction is a chiseled, go-for-broke disc with a modicum of overdubs, melodic flourishes, and even harmonies.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    And the Anonymous Nobody
    An eclectic genre mashup with an enviable roster of guests, And The Anonymous Nobody… bristles with creative rebirth and more than a touch of hard-earned, “we’re back” braggadocio.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Psychedelic Pill
    Psychedelic Pill, with all its gritty warmth and haunting memories, is among his homiest.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    White Chalk
    Harvey has one of the most forceful voices around, but here she relies on her silk-thin upper register to create a delicate album that skates across despair without ever quite sinking into it.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Odd Blood
    Odd Blood is every bit as dense as its predecessor, with every inch of space teeming with exhausting polyrhythmic detail and time-warped synth sounds.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    New Amerykah Part Two: Return of the Ankh
    “Fall In Love” rides on a swirling, almost psychedelic Eddie Kendricks loop that connects it to Part One as confidently as much of the rest of the new material stands on its own.
    • 87 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Let's Stay Friends
    Let's Stay Friends is LSF's comeback--and frontman Tim Harrington and crew have picked up precisely where they left off.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Now Only
    Elverum may spend the rest of his career grappling with his grief. It’s a tough, beautiful privilege to be invited along on that journey.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Tight Knit
    Earlier Vetiver records cultivated an air of backwoods mysticism, heavy on acoustic picking and tribal percussion, but Tight Knit is a leap ahead, stepping out of the mists and shadows and into a warm, bright clearing.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Kiss Each Other Clean
    The music reflects the excitement of a man who realizes he's onto something; Beam's vocals have never been so strong, and the bountiful instrumentation marks a musician eager to show off the range of options he's discovered.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Face Tat
    At times, the album may seem like it's made to confuse as much as thrill, but neither of those gets to the truth of Face Tat. Simply put, to paraphrase one of Hill's lyrics, it'll turn you into energy.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Josephine
    The sympathetic accompaniment of his expansive band--which abandons its on-stage Crazy Horse roar to operate in a spare, desolate gray area between funeral-paced country and bloodshot soul on the quietly breathtaking Josephine--does nothing to make Molina seem any less alone.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Vivian Girls
    By the time the track 'Where Do You Run To'--and its echoing impersonation of Joy Division's 'A Means To An End'--shambles by, Vivian Girls morphs from a work of nosebleed pop into something icy and numbing.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Three Futures
    There aren’t many hooks to be found here, which means a lot of Three Futures sort of blurs together. But it’s all hazily fascinating, flowing naturally through its various peaks and valleys, and it succeeds in Scott’s goal of being truly immersive listening--something that reveals itself to you in strange new ways each time you return.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Jericho Sirens
    It all works. Whenever Hot Snakes decide to get together, they will always be welcome.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Fortress Around My Heart
    The album only has two full-fledged ballads, and while they don’t burst with the same life as the rest of the record, they showcase the songwriting and performance chops that should earn Maria a notable career beyond this impressive debut.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Coexist
    Coexist presents a version of The xx that listeners will recognize, but cleans everything up a bit, subtly stretching and improving the formula that won acclaim.
    • 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.
    • 94 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Icky Mettle [Deluxe Edition]
    The new double-disc edition of Icky Mettle explains why hopes for AoL were so high, and why those hopes may have been misplaced.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Algiers
    What New Orleans does seem to have inspired in Calexico, though, is some of its best songwriting.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Leaders Of The Free World
    Leaders Of The Free World contains songs as heavy and epic as the neo-prog of Elbow's first two albums, but it's strongest at its quietest.
    • 92 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Lemonade
    All over Lemonade, Beyoncé is describing her own personal reality, on her terms and informed by her worldview. That the album simultaneously pushes mainstream music into smarter, deeper places is simply a reminder of why she remains pop’s queen.
    • 88 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Reservation [Mixtape]
    Employing a grab-bag of producers and sounds both trendy and timeless, Reservation is a cohesive mish-mash, a multifaceted exhibition of a young artist with an arresting sense of self-possession.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Once I Was an Eagle
    Eagle is a master class in creation.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    The Plot Against Common Sense
    Plot smoothes some edges and makes others more ragged, but the songs, shaped by the sharp guitars and martial drumming, are some of the strongest Falkous has ever written.
    • 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.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    On the Ones and Threes
    Older, wiser, and a little weathered around the edges, Versus no longer has time for irony or niceties. Accordingly, On The Ones isn't a nostalgic tickle--it's a wake-up punch.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Boy King
    More so than ever on the new Boy King, Wild Beasts seem especially comfortable and confident with their wayward electro. Which only shows in the added coats of glitz.
    • 75 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Mo'Mega
    Like The Coup's strangely simpatico latest album, Lif's frisky, humane Mo'Mega redefines what a political rap album can be.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    1372 Overton Park
    With young contenders like The Gaslight Anthem hot on their heels, the members of Lucero have shown that they can still stretch, grow, and move forward--even while keeping a reverent eye on the rearview mirror.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Universal Themes
    They’re occasionally manic and often rambling, but nevertheless they offer brutally honest and undeniably fascinating glimpses into his life and worldview.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    The Obliterati
    As the price of success, The Obliterati faces significantly higher expectations. Once again, though, Burma succeeds and surprises by playing to its strengths while moving forward.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Give a Glimpse of What Yer Not
    The intimacy it reaches on Give A Glimpse Of What Yer Not is as hard won as it’s ever been. The band approaches it from the obtuse angles only it can, arriving there because of its excessive volume, its unorthodox tempos, and its lyrical inscrutability, not in spite of it. To the uninitiated, it may seem formulaic, but it’s the self-imposed limitations that make Dinosaur Jr. so distinctive.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    I Hate Music
    There isn’t anything new on I Hate Music, but there’s no need for it.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Tween
    Despite the all-over-the-map vibe, Tween doesn’t sound like a bunch of leftovers or music pushed to the side. Every song is fully formed, and is imbued with a sense of purpose.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Going Grey
    The Front Bottoms are more confident, and secure enough to confess to all they don’t yet know. It’s a privilege to listen in as they work it out.
    • 68 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    MAYA
    Conspiracy-addled claustrophobic noises swath the hooks throughout, revealing the intoxicating assuredness of a star who sought the spotlight in order to barrage it with glitter and shrapnel.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Junk
    It’s easily M83’s most challenging, best album to date.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Murdering Oscar (And Other Love Songs)
    It’s merely an excellent companion to Hood’s recent work with his regular band, with several songs--including the Springsteen-like 'Pollyanna' and the smoldering guitar workout 'Walking Around Sense'--ranking with his very best.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Sleeper
    Refreshing earnestness has always been one of his strengths, and Sleeper, inspired by the death of his father, is an honest study on loneliness, heartbreaking without ever becoming maudlin.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Tommy
    Tommy doesn’t aim to dazzle like 2008’s Wolves And Wishes or 2006’s The Lost Take; instead, it focuses all its tech-wizardry on some of the most vulnerable, exultant melodies Dosh has captured yet.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Black Pompadour
    At their best—pretty much all of Black Pompadour qualifies—The Zincs sound like an accomplished friend, sharing skill and knowledge without being pretentious about it.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Lucifer on the Sofa
    Lucifer On The Sofa is one of the band’s most focused songwriting efforts yet: Every note feels deliberately placed and well-constructed, with crisp arrangements (the piano-sprinkled ballad “My Babe”), piercing hooks (the elastic “The Devil & Mr. Jones”) and sweeping dynamics (the melodramatic, glammy art-rock waltz “Satellite”).
    • 69 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    From the Corner to the Block
    When the guests fall back on what's always worked well enough, Galactic seems to take that as a challenge, and takes enough risks to make it sound a little fresher.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    In The 7th Moon, The Chief Turned Into A Swimming Fish And Ate The Head Of His Enemy By Magic
    The result is even more appealing than Konono, drawing on likembes, the buzzing and drum-like tam tam, electric guitars, and half a dozen vocalists to create hypnotic, rich, complex polyrhythmic wonders.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Human Performance
    Human Performance as a whole feels less rigid (and abrasive) and more personal in how it deals with restlessness and dread.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Ravedeath, 1972
    Complex and rewarding in a way that the telescoping salvia trip of An Imaginary Country never was, and tougher and more fibrous than the excellent Haunt Me Haunt Me, Do It Again, Ravedeath, 1972 somehow manages to soothe even as it disorients.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    The Trials Of Van Occupanther
    Van Occupanther's spell finally breaks a little more than halfway through its 11 tracks, when the songs begin to feel more fussed-over and conceptual and less organic, but the warmth never fades.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Fires Within Fires
    Fires Within Fires is yet another invaluable contribution from this legendary band.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    We Were Dead Before The Ship Even Sank
    Easier than ever to grasp, yet still constantly, joyously vexing, We Were Dead is another terrific set from a band that couldn't make something dull even if drowning were the only other option.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Father of the Bride
    Father Of The Bride isn’t the shocking rebirth that might have been expected, given all of the information that trickled out about it over the past six years. Instead, it’s just far enough from expectations to surprise, but close enough to remain true. It’s a little messy and a little weird (and, again, a little long), but exactly the right record for Vampire Weekend right now.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Dark Matter
    Dark Matter is dense, complicated stuff, though it’s also an engrossing display of pop theater.
    • 91 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Titanic Rising
    Rado’s opulent production gives the experience of listening to Titanic Rising—particularly on headphones—the feeling of being enveloped in sound, insulated from the outside world like an astronaut looking down at the earth through layers of atmosphere. The lyrics on Titanic Rising certainly contribute to the album’s daydream quality.
    • 87 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Person Pitch
    Sometimes ominous, sometimes celebratory, always compelling, Person Pitch is as clattering and tactile as a beaded curtain.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Ire Works
    Ire Works is a near-perfect pileup of craft and chaos--and it shows that Dillinger's recent injuries left some beautiful scars.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Overgrown
    James Blake’s talent is in his ability to smoothly synthesize disparate influences; his willingness to grow and develop while doing so is fascinating and frequently rapturous.
    • 88 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Big Time
    Big Time is a monumental work on loss and how quickly things can change. We see Olsen come into a new power as a songwriter, resulting in an album filled to the brim with radiance and conviction.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Wolf's Law
    The songs on this album are echoing, but not distant; they connect on a personal level, and then pull the listener along in a mighty heave.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Santogold
    Though at times it threatens to become overbearing in its eclecticism, Santogold's solid lyricism and pop sensibility keep the album from disappearing up its own ass.
    • 70 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Sounds Of The Universe
    With Universe and 2005’s "Playing The Angel," Depeche Mode has created back-to-back albums compelling enough to stand up to its past best.
    • 71 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    The Bachelor
    When the dust settles around the closing notes of The Bachelor’s outro, 'The Messenger,' it’s clear that Wolf has achieved that rare artistic feat: total catharsis. And a beautiful batch of it, at that.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Tarot Sport
    For most of the songs amassed here, it still takes around 10 minutes to get the job done--threading those thick synthesizer blasts and all that skittering digital manna through a brick wall of guitar fuzz--but Fuck Buttons succeeds at turning its unpredictable epics into masterpieces of pacing and strange beauty.
    • 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.
    • 75 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Be the Void
    That Dr. Dog has written some supremely catchy tunes isn't too surprising, but few would expect its (or any band's) fifth record to be every bit as exciting as its first.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Shaking the Habitual
    Shaking The Habitual has minor drawbacks—it wastes too much time on shambling instrumentals, and a wall-to-wall rager would have been great—but this brother-sister team is still heroically alienating and giddily perverse.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Hip Hop Is Dead
    It contains a smart, tight, cohesive analysis of where rap went astray, but also the seeds of the genre's rebirth and renewal.
    • 75 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Droppin' Science Fiction
    It's the rare supergroup that's actually super.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Nikki Nack
    Nikki Nack, Garbus’ third effort, is polished, meticulously produced, and very much a studio effort.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Schmilco
    Schmilco is Wilco’s most musically simple and emotionally resonant record in a decade, gorgeously naked and efficient.
    • 70 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Art Official Age
    A stellar album that functions more as an ellipsis than a period. This album is an indicator that Prince is still pulling levers and asking questions.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    The Drift
    It's unlikely that any other album will sound much like The Drift this year, and even less likely that it could be forgotten if heard even once.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Challengers
    If previous New Pornographers albums are the musical equivalent of Jolt Cola, Challengers is the caffeine-free diet version: less sugary, more mature, initially not as invigorating, but ultimately just as addictive.
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