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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    • 88 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Remedy
    The duo's self-proclaimed "remedy" is nowhere near as revolutionary as the hype would insinuate, but it does offer its distinct pleasures
    • 86 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Dead Cities, Red Seas & Lost Ghosts
    As monumental as Dead Cities sounds in parts, its uniformity proves oppressively stirring after just a few tracks.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Skinty Fia
    More than anything, however, Skinty Fia’s plodding progression and miserabilist overtones come across like cut-rate versions of Bauhaus’ chilly gothic vibes and the aforementioned Joy Division’s claustrophobic dirge, only without the benefit of the latter group’s inimitable basslines.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    The Harrow and the Harvest
    Relaxed and steady-a little too much.
    • 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.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Come to Where I'm From
    Arthur's shortcomings as a lyricist make his emotional palette seem as limited as his sonic palette is varied and, however layered the production, his songwriting nearly always follows suit.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Doris
    It often feels less like a finished work than a sketchbook, a jumble of beats and raps (about half of them from guests) with little in the way of hooks, choruses, or general songcraft to tie them together.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Adore Life
    It’s a shame that so much of the Savages album feels like a songwriting rut, because the record’s lone moment of transcendence, “Adore,” also stamps out a repeating coda at its end.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Leave It All Behind
    Nicolay has never been afraid to go soft and smooth, but his production on Leave It sometimes borders on easy listening.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Hot Thoughts
    Spoon is a master of hooky songwriting, but Hot Thoughts seems so bent on undermining it that the band undersells itself. Maybe Hot Thoughts is an apt title after all--it’s got great ideas, but the execution is lacking.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Asleep In The Back
    Establishing a languorous mood right away, the album is all meandering, low-key moods and textures, with precious few focused songs on which to hang them.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Hiss Spun
    Hiss Spun is a full-on sludge-metal extravaganza, never content to go slow and heavy when it could be going slower and heavier. The bombast is overwhelming, and while there’s an admirable zeal to her drive for making almost every second as intense as possible, it begins to get numbing.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Chemtrails Over the Country Club
    “Tulsa Jesus Freak” is arguably closest to the Lana Del Rey longtime fans know and love, and it’s no surprise that it was written in 2019, around the time NFR! came out. “Yosemite” is another highlight, a stunning number with Del Rey’s vocals at their best. But most songs on Chemtrails don’t stand out. They blend together in their delicateness.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Scissor Sisters
    Scattershot.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Crack-Up
    The band has always prided itself on ornateness, and in that sense, Crack-Up is its richest release to date. But more often than not, all that fussiness robs it of any impact.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    All Is Dream
    Mercury Rev's ongoing foray into a strange sort of beauty overload remains a noble endeavor, but it inspires more admiration than emotional attachment.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Kill For Love
    The ambience is fine enough, but it's probably worth just waiting for the movie.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    After the Party
    While The Menzingers’ best work has always been about grappling with personality flaws in the interest of becoming a better person, After The Party only offers surface-level reflections, to the detriment of the band itself.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Le Noise
    The man responsible for enduring political anthems like "Ohio" and "Rockin' In The Free World" gets a pass for similarly mawkish songs like "Love And War" and "Angry World" that don't go any deeper than their titles. But Le Noise doesn't deserve the same concession.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    The "W"
    Although roughly half as long as Wu-Tang Forever, The W is every bit as erratic and overreaching. If Forever was a great single album hidden in a messy two-disc set, The W feels like a good six-song EP nestled inside an uneven album that seems to take its cues from the half-assed weirdness of ODB's N**** Please.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Tell Me How You Really Feel
    Tell Me How You Really Feel is a disappointing and muted record that never quite lives up to its potential.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Sound of Water
    Saint Etienne has made an egregiously Cardigans-esque wrong turn, abandoning impeccable craft and Motown melodies for the breezy if aimless experimentation of its wildly uneven EPs.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    American III: Solitary Man
    Like Neil Young's Silver And Gold, it feels like a thematically empty, knockabout place-holder. American Recordings, one of Cash's towering classics, was all devotion and doubt, a brilliant, raw-boned meditation on redemption and death. A loose, flat set of odds and ends, Solitary Man is merely a minor but endearing record from a man who seems to know he's given more than enough.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Pawn Shoppe Heart
    Occasionally catchy and exciting. [17 Mar 2004]
    • The A.V. Club
    • 79 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    A Black Mile to the Surface
    There’s some beautiful songwriting here, but it’s buried beneath the smudges of its producers.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    All That You Can't Leave Behind
    Ten albums into its career, U2's emphasis on its basics--chiming guitars, a war-themed lament here and there, the enormous choruses of songs like "Beautiful Day"--is a refreshing reminder of the group's core virtues. But in terms of execution, it splits about 50-50 between soaring hits and dispiriting misses.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Band of Brothers
    Unfortunately for Nelson, Band Of Brothers isn’t the country legend’s best album of all time. It’s pretty good at best, a must only for reasonably hardcore Nelson fans.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Biophilia
    As minimally executed as it is maximally conceived, Biophilia doesn't sculpt emptiness; it swims in it.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Year Of The Gentleman
    With his latest, Ne-Yo's winning groove devolves into a rut, and his quiet storm gets awfully sleepy
    • 79 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Cripple Crow
    Flags in equally fruitful and frustrating ways.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Wanderer
    There’s nothing inherently wrong about Wanderer being mannered--but, unfortunately, the album’s subtlety is also often its undoing.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    The Slow Rush
    Parker’s long-awaited Currents follow-up, The Slow Rush, isn’t quite as interesting as its predecessors in terms of songwriting and production, and this gap makes Parker’s lyrical weaknesses more challenging to ignore.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    No, You C'Mon
    Sounds too slight for the non-devout.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    No Cities Left
    There's a strange, almost perfectly equatorial divide between five largely stunning songs, and six that might shine brighter in lesser company. As arranged, it's jarringly half-brilliant and half-blah.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Crash
    Overall, CRASH’s crystal clear production and iron-clad writing has all of the force behind it to propel the album into the stratosphere. But instead of putting the pedal to the metal in pursuit of a high camp sound, it stays in the slow lane.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Uh Huh Her
    Her varied approach yields varied results: Sometimes the disc sounds like a mature summing up of previous work; at other times, it sounds like a closet-cleaning.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Your Blues
    Bejar's shifting style seems like a work in progress, and a lot of these songs are too much of nothing. [17 Mar 2004]
    • The A.V. Club
    • 79 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Nouns
    Nouns' effect is hazy, numbing, and merely pleasant--quite the opposite of experiencing No Age in person.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    When The Pawn...
    Apple is ... crafty, covering up her rambling, dorm-friendly lyrics with sharp arrangements and sturdy songcraft.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Black City
    In the end, Dear has successfully turned a tense, eerie mood into songs. They just aren't songs most people will feel like hearing.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    The Chronicles of Marnia
    The Chronicles Of Marnia is chock full of these reminders of Stern’s instrumental dexterity and flawlessly meticulous execution, but without the intense theatrics, flair, and helter-skelter points of tension and release, it never quite transcends into the thrilling mess that is such a good vehicle for her talents.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Ma Fleur
    Ma Fleur is heavy on atmospheric standing still, with tunes not beguiling enough to make listeners stop to examine them up close.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Atlas
    The Real Estate of Days was eager to take the listener off guard, to show off its ample musicianship through tunefully off-kilter songs. In contrast, the band that made Atlas seems to be hesitatingly wondering what to do next. Here’s hoping it’s something surprising.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Supreme Balloon
    The songs are generally jubilant, as signaled by the whirring synth giggles and quasi-Cuban bassline in 'Rainbow Flag,' but also slight in a way that suggests much of Supreme Balloon would have been a lot more fun to make than it is to listen to.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Crimson
    Alkaline Trio's shtick isn't as cartoonish as that of goth-punk outfit AFI, but it can be a bit silly.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Nobody's Smiling
    A collection of mostly forgettable tracks that tries far too hard and has little to show for it.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Lullabies To Paralyze
    Without other strong personalities in the band to rein him in, Homme's occasional excesses undercuts what makes QOTSA so great.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Matangi
    The problem is that the record sat on the shelf for so long... that anything that may have once seemed fresh on the record now seems more than a little tired.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    A Different Ship
    Framing Temple's songs in display-case glass only reveals how little they have going on, and the tidy production saps his band of its best trait: its scrappiness.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Whiteout Conditions
    In the immediate, Whiteout Conditions might leave you a little cold.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Run Rabbit Run
    It’s a lot of talent (among the arrangers gathered is Philip Glass protégé Nico Muhly), and a little novelty--par for the course when it comes to Stevens.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Seeds
    Seeds reflects a band unconcerned with challenging its listeners this time and more interested in delivering a complete collection of competent, mark-bearing songs for the sake of proudly stating the existence of TV On The Radio in 2014.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    A Blessing And A Curse
    The bulk of the album is made of slight, rote country-rockers, as sturdy and flat as a table.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Emperor of Sand
    Emperor Of Sand is both progressive and regressive, as Mastodon takes two different parts of its past and slaps them together. And while it occasionally works, more often than not Mastodon just sounds confused.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Is Is [EP]
    Yeah Yeah Yeahs doesn't inspire much patience on the Is Is EP; instead, it rewards it with frustrating hints.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Feminist Sweepstakes
    Lacking some of its predecessor's musical inventiveness, Feminist Sweepstakes revisits similar terrain, but Hanna's increasing bitterness makes it hard to tell whether even she believes what she's saying.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Ash Wednesday
    Ultimately, though, there's no transcendence for Perkins or the listener, making Ash Wednesday a tough listen with limited rewards.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Ryan Adams
    Ryan Adams is, for better or for worse, just another Ryan Adams record--but neither Adams nor his fans seem to have a problem with that.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Frkwys, Vol. 9: Icon Give Thank
    Ultimately, Icon Give Thank sounds more like a Sun Araw album with a few guest vocalist features rather than a mutually beneficial musical conversation.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Push Any Button
    She doesn’t capture that magic consistently on the rest of the album, though, which leaves Push Any Button feeling jumpy and unfocused.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    On
    By the time On reaches its finale, it's stored up enough goodwill that it's more than possible to believe that there's an art to all this artlessness.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Reign of Terror
    On Reign Of Terror, Sleigh Bells is cornered in by its own sound, unwilling to risk more adventurous metal excursions or get vulnerable enough to fully embrace its emerging lighter side.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    You Are All I See
    You Are All I See is the debut album from Active Child, the band that Los Angeles singer-songwriter Pat Grossi has steadily built around his sweeping harp, pining falsetto, and shuddering beats.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Are You Serious
    Unfortunately, the highlights here are exceptions rather than the rule.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Civilians
    So many of his songs sound damnably similar, blanded-out by his pinched rasp and seeming disinterest in melody.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Motivational Jumpsuit
    It’s difficult to find any song on Motivational Jumpsuit that GBV lifers can place among the group’s most accomplished work.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Are You Thinking What I'm Thinking?
    Too much of The Like's personality is borrowed, but it is, nonetheless, a personality.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Wise Up Ghost and Other Songs
    At this point in his career, an album-length experiment like Wise Up Ghost seems to satisfy Costello artistically, thanks to his chameleon tendencies, but there isn’t much to add to the best of either catalog.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    They Threw Us in a Trench and Stuck a Monument On Top
    It's grating and electrifying in equal measure.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Silver/Lead
    On these songs [“Playing Harp For The Fishes,” “Short Elevated Period,” and “Diamonds In Cups”], Silver/Lead strikes the perfect balance of moody intrigue and saw-toothed aggression. Unfortunately, the rest of the album isn’t calibrated quite as precisely, which makes for an uneven listening experience.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    22 Dreams
    There's a sense of fun and wonder to 22 Dreams that keeps it from feeling pretentious--just not any less tedious.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Go Tell Fire To The Mountain
    For all the outsider posturing, Mountain is a pretty conventional indie-rock record circa 2011, drawing on celebrated warhorses like Arcade Fire's Funeral and Animal Collective's Merriweather Post Pavilion, as well as somewhat less fashionable sources, like Vampire Weekend and Kings Of Leon.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Memoirs At The End Of The World
    Much of Memoirs seems familiar even on first listen; it’s all been done better before.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    No Love Deep Web
    Even at a meaty 46 minutes, the album still suffers from a feeling of writer's block.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Who Built the Moon?
    It’s like an extremely amped-up version of Oasis, but the excesses sway from impressive to taxing. Often the effort to be interesting just comes off as nonsensical cacophony.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    The Heat
    Malin's strained whine makes his earnest lyrics sound more pretentious than they probably are.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Oversteps
    The songs are usually too singular to fit together in any immediately recognizable way. Instead, structure and emotional resonance emerge slowly from a mix of disparate sounds, providing a soundtrack capable of transforming the mundane into the alarming, then the consoling, and back again.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Planet Her
    While the pleasant-enough arrangements may make for an effective summer record, Planet Her lacks the originality Doja made her name on, and no amount of stunning and spacey visuals (as in the music video for “Need To Know”) can make the songs better than they are.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    (III)
    Instead of anarchist dance jams full of crunchy 8-bit noise, (III) is more like a static-filled radio station fading in and out of range.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Choice of Weapon
    Without any standout songs to propel it, Choice Of Weapon may be a return to style, but it's not a return to form.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Northern Aggression
    Those who hoped Wynn would bring that inventive spirit and boldness back to his band for its third album will be disappointed: Northern Aggression is almost surprising in its straightforwardness.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    The Back Room
    The album starts repeating itself and the returns start diminishing.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Throwing Muses [2003]
    As a whole, Throwing Muses still contains too much formless slop, but at least it's energetic.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Street Songs of Love
    The rush of Escovedo's ecstasy and agony proves frustratingly one-sided on the stale, hard-to-embrace Street Songs Of Love, which reduces all the unruly feelings that go with rough-and-tumble romantic relationships down to a series of blustery, MOR power ballads.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Romantica
    Just another average album by a band that has proved it can make great ones.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    You're the One
    Though not exactly a bad album, when contrasted to the remarkable Graceland and Rhythm Of The Saints, it sounds as arbitrary as a collection of B-sides.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Wolves
    Wolves is somehow even more polished, almost glossy to a fault with its compression and ladled-on sweetening of the distortion. At times, it veers dangerously close to latter-day Metallica.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Golden Era
    Del takes a trip down memory lane on Golden Era, but it's never as special or profound the second time around.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Manners
    Manners attempts to synthesize Michael Angelakos’ natural talent for dance music with more straightforward, heart-on-sleeve rock, but can’t quite commit to either.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    The Good, The Bad & The Queen
    It's easy to respect the album's sustained washed-out tone, but it'd be nice if the songs were memorable past their running time. Intrigue without any payoff makes for pretty dull listening.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Sugaring Season
    Without a steady beat to ground it, Orton's music tends to float into the ether. And unfortunately in the case of Sugaring Season, this means many of the album's best, moving moments fade into the background.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    1000 Forms of Fear
    1000 Forms Of Fear certainly has the songs and contemporary sheen to make Sia a star in her own right, but it’s at the expense of both her emotional intimacy and her offbeat personality.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Woodstock--40 Years On: Back To Yasgur's Farm
    For one weekend, they all happened to be picked up by a state-of-the-art Ampex tape machine. A few made history. The rest made background noise for half a million kids who behaved really, really well. That’s one for the books, all right—but not necessarily one for the ears.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Tranquility Base Hotel + Casino
    The album feels unmoored and even plodding due to a lack of structure.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Screws Get Loose
    Sadly, Screws Get Loose is a serious step backward, ditching the anarchic honky-tonk of old in favor of ho-hum, girly surf pop in the vein of the Dum Dum Girls and Vivian Girls.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Blood Pressures
    In spite of some solid material and smoky performances by Mosshart, Blood Pressures does little to change that.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Elsie
    It's because Elsie sounds so much like The Gaslight Anthem operating at half-power that the album proves disappointing.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Everyday Robots
    It’s a pretty enough record, but not one that makes any sort of impression, breaks any ground, or leaves listeners wanting more.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    In Mind
    Pleasant sonic wallpaper that unfortunately doesn’t leave much of a lasting impression.
    • 75 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Centipede Hz
    Centipede Hz insists that listeners think their way to liking it.
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