The Guardian's Scores

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For 5,507 reviews, this publication has graded:
  • 49% higher than the average critic
  • 3% same as the average critic
  • 48% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 3.2 points lower than other critics. (0-100 point scale)
Average Music review score: 70
Highest review score: 100 All Born Screaming
Lowest review score: 10 Unpredictable
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 2,966 out of 5507
  2. Mixed: 2,464 out of 5507
  3. Negative: 77 out of 5507
5507 music reviews
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    • 87 Metascore
    • 100 Critic Score
    Hit Parade
    A really masterful album.
    • 87 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Anchor
    Anchor is as steadfast and timeless as its title implies. Not that it is a record of ancient lore: it is a broadminded, spellbinding and often surprising collection of songs, celebrating the influences on the family and their friends.
    • 87 Metascore
    • 100 Critic Score
    V
    V, on the other hand, sounds, potentially at least, like a huge mainstream hit. It performs the not inconsiderable feat of sounding commercial without losing any of the Horrors’ essence or individuality.
    • 87 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Isolation
    Isolation is a record that feels rich, self-assured and deeply personal--and one that should ensure Uchis isn’t relegated to second billing ever again.
    • 87 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    22, A Million
    For all its undoubted oddness, what’s striking about the album is how straightforwardly enjoyable it is.
    • 87 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Springsteen on Broadway
    Springsteen on Broadway is a really charming album--charming enough, in fact, to convince a Boss agnostic that there’s more to the man than they might previously have thought--and its charm rests on Springsteen’s alternating conflicting desires to let light in on what he calls “the magic trick”, and suggest that it might really be magic after all.
    • 87 Metascore
    • 100 Critic Score
    Kalak
    Made in collaboration with electronic producer Photay, Kalak is a beguiling body of work, enveloping the listener in undulating synth melodies, layered horn fanfares and vocal features – all driven forward by Korwar’s ever-present percussion.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 100 Critic Score
    Let England Shake
    You're left with a richly inventive album that's unlike anything else in Harvey's back catalogue.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 100 Critic Score
    Sound Of Silver
    This is dance-rock for grown-ups: extraordinary.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Róisín Machine
    Róisín Machine is a sharper, more focused album than 2016’s Take Her Up to Monto; one which reins in some, but not all, of its author’s eccentricities.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Body Talk
    You could argue that Robyn does sexy, bolshy, catchy pop so effortlessly – as evidenced again by the new tracks, especially Call Your Girlfriend – that Body Talk should have been edited into a straightforward killer pop album.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Oil Of Every Pearl's Un-Insides
    Despite software advances, so many electronic producers are content to lapse into nostalgia or a safe, compromised emotional range; Sophie has crafted a genuinely original sound and uses it to visit extremes of terror, sadness and pleasure.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Who Kill
    Whereas the musical and lyrical boldness of her 2009 debut, Bird-Brains, was a little muted by her homespun recording techniques, here every fragmenting note and confrontational idea is exhilaratingly crisp.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Audio Vertigo
    He experiments with texture and even puts it through a vocoder but, for all Elbow’s adventures, the foundations are still classy songwriting, heart and soul.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Remind Me Tomorrow
    This ambitious, arresting album feels like the work of an artist wielding her considerable talents with newfound confidence and conviction.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    thank u, next
    As with Rihanna’s Anti, this feels like the work of a pop star previously happy to act as conduit for other people, finally working out who they are and what they want to say. Here, Grande finds her voice.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 100 Critic Score
    The Complete Matrix Tapes [Box Set]
    It’s fascinating stuff, even for those for whom a 37-minute version of Sister Ray is pushing it a bit. It’s actually where the band stretch out that it becomes most fascinating.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 100 Critic Score
    Far from Over
    As a contemporary jazz set, Far from Over has just about everything.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Welcome To Mali
    This is Amadou and Mariam's album, and their Africa-pop crossover success continues.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 100 Critic Score
    Natalie Prass
    The touchstones here, such as Dusty in Memphis, are all records that revel in a particular kind of musicality, yet this is a record that never feels retro, just timeless.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    A Sailor's Guide to Earth
    It’s hardly a revolutionary album, but its melding of styles--pedal steel is draped across the songs like Spanish moss, and Estonian guitarist Laur Joamets takes solos off in deliciously unexpected directions, sometimes veering towards space--gives it a fresh, unsullied feeling. Simpson’s writing, too, is fantastic.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 100 Critic Score
    Mirrored
    The way repeated listens allow its unobvious rhythmic and melodic logic to take root is fantastically rewarding.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Compassion
    Stevie Wonder’s Overjoyed (a fittingly ecstatic Iyer homage to Chick Corea’s interpretation) is unfolded over a rocking left hand and Tyshawn Sorey’s crackling polyrhythms, sparking one of several breathtakingly headlong Iyer solos on the set, coolly placing fragments and twists of the original theme into the onrush despite its scorching pace.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 100 Critic Score
    Bon Iver
    Bon Iver remains rooted in the emotional sincerity that made Vernon's debut so mesmerising.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    How I Got Over
    Their ninth album finds the Philadelphia veterans a unique voice in hip-hop.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Love & Hate
    A beautiful melody, wrapped in gauzy textures, [Falling is] a fantastic song, exquisitely arranged, something Love & Hate is packed with: the work of an artist coming into his own.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Mogoya
    The result is an impressive, attacking set, but then Sangaré has always been adventurous.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Singles 1978-2016 [Box Set]
    There’s a dip in overall quality in the last decade or so, but 2010’s Bury! is among their best.
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