The Independent (UK)'s Scores
- Music
For 2,189 reviews, this publication has graded:
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47% higher than the average critic
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4% same as the average critic
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49% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 3 points lower than other critics.
(0-100 point scale)
Average Music review score: 70
Highest review score: | THE TORTURED POETS DEPARTMENT | |
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Lowest review score: | Donda |
Score distribution:
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Positive: 1,172 out of 2189
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Mixed: 988 out of 2189
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Negative: 29 out of 2189
2189
music
reviews
- By Date
- By Critic Score
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- Critic Score
The entire thing is produced meticulously; each track slides into the next to ensure the party never stops. Club Future Nostalgia is pure, undiluted fun.- The Independent (UK)
- Posted Aug 28, 2020
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- The Independent (UK)
- Posted Jun 11, 2012
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- Critic Score
His symphonic-soul innovations here would map out the course of much 1970s soul music, while his use of multi-layered vocals – the happy result of an engineer accidentally running two vocal takes in the same mix – added an extra element to Gaye's vocal armoury which he would use extensively throughout the rest of his career.- The Independent (UK)
- Posted Aug 2, 2011
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- Critic Score
Imagine Killing Eve in audio form. They’re still that kick-ass. That sexy. That much fun. Put this album on your to-listen list, pronto.- The Independent (UK)
- Posted Jun 10, 2021
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- Critic Score
Though their themes remain in the gutter, Suede aspire to monuments, and The Blue Hour will stand as another sordid masterwork.- The Independent (UK)
- Posted Sep 20, 2018
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- Critic Score
This re-recording is a better, brighter version of a terrific pop album. Red is dead. Long live Red (Taylor's Version).- The Independent (UK)
- Posted Nov 11, 2021
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- Critic Score
Like Randy Newman, the Mael brothers have a knack for voicing the hopes and regrets of diverse, sometimes unsympathetic characters; and the latitude afforded by their operatic arrangements allows them to add commentary in real time, like an instrumental Greek chorus.- The Independent (UK)
- Posted Sep 7, 2017
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- Critic Score
Letissier makes her vintage synths snap, crackle, pop, fizz, freeze, squelch, shimmer and soar.- The Independent (UK)
- Posted Sep 20, 2018
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- The Independent (UK)
- Posted May 8, 2015
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- Critic Score
A set of songs seething with dark knowledge, as Bejar peeks behind the curtain of appearances in search of underlying motivations.- The Independent (UK)
- Posted Oct 19, 2017
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- Critic Score
With Helplessness Blues, Fleet Foxes triumphantly deliver on the promise of their popular debut, the album that helped establish folk-rock once again as a formidable commercial force rather than just a fringe interest.- The Independent (UK)
- Posted Apr 29, 2011
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- Critic Score
Realised here in more expressive interpretations, and interspersed with poems read by her daughter, the actress Gabrielle Drake, these songs are full of acute observations, deft allusions and metaphors, and the subtlest of emotional revelations, wielded with an English restraint redolent with the aromas of freshly-mowed lawns and cucumber sandwiches.- The Independent (UK)
- Posted May 24, 2017
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- Critic Score
The character of the base music here is overwhelming: complex, ebullient and life-affirming, and in yoking this intricate dance music to his sophisticated New Yorker sensibility, Simon created a transatlantic bridge that neither pandered to nor patronised either culture.- The Independent (UK)
- Posted Jun 8, 2012
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- Critic Score
You can feel the weight of the piano keys and sense the reverb on the mic, or its absence when Morissette lays her isolated vocals bare to stunning effect on “Her”. ... Superb album.- The Independent (UK)
- Posted Jul 29, 2020
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- Critic Score
While the production here is as slick as IGOR, though, there’s less of a through line. IGOR was the devastating pieced-together parts of a broken relationship. CMIYGL plays fast and loose with its subjects, relying instead on the music itself to carry listeners through. ... Tyler, the Creator continues to defy expectations.- The Independent (UK)
- Posted Jun 25, 2021
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- Critic Score
Colorado shows that Young, at 73, has lost none of his outrage and passion. ... Saying so much, so beautifully, Colorado was worth the wait.- The Independent (UK)
- Posted Oct 24, 2019
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- Critic Score
The Queen Of Hearts, a sublime collection of old songs given contemporary heart transplants without ever betraying their essential original truth and spirit.- The Independent (UK)
- Posted Jul 7, 2017
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- Critic Score
For Those I Love is as much a piece of history as it is a work of art. ... A staggering album.- The Independent (UK)
- Posted Mar 25, 2021
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- Critic Score
A stunning celebration of Black, gay love. ... It is also a groundbreaking proclamation of personal acceptance.- The Independent (UK)
- Posted Mar 25, 2021
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- Critic Score
Grunge-rinsed, feminist-flipped, upcycled Fifties guitar an’ all: Crushing is a triumph.- The Independent (UK)
- Posted Feb 21, 2019
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- Critic Score
On this, Gillian Welch's fifth album, the familiar blending of traditional sounds and moods with modern sensibilities is effortlessly sustained through songs like the mordant "The Way It Goes" ("Betsy Johnson bought the farm, stuck a needle in her arm, that's the way that it goes").- The Independent (UK)
- Posted Jun 24, 2011
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- Critic Score
These are big themes, dealt with imaginatively by a singer and a band both operating at the peak of their powers. Album of the year?- The Independent (UK)
- Posted Feb 15, 2013
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- Critic Score
On Basic Volume, he’s an alchemist producing gold from the depths of his city, placing his art ahead of himself, and on this thrilling, dynamic and complex release, that gold shines brighter than most other releases this year.- The Independent (UK)
- Posted Jul 26, 2018
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- The Independent (UK)
- Posted Feb 7, 2014
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- Critic Score
Where most rock superstars sink into trad tedium by 69, Springsteen is still crafting sophisticated paeans of depth and illumination, a rock grandmaster worthy of the accolade. A must-have for anyone who has a heart.- The Independent (UK)
- Posted Jun 12, 2019
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- Critic Score
That he manages to express such ethical and religious principles without coming across like a sanctimonious buzz-killer is quite remarkable.- The Independent (UK)
- Posted Dec 16, 2011
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- Critic Score
The tracks on i/o grow both on and in a listener like seeds germinating. Those who like their song structures neat and tidy may struggle with the jazz odysseys, but Gabriel asks very little of his fans – just time. Give him that, and you will find this album gently becoming part of you on a cellular level.- The Independent (UK)
- Posted Nov 30, 2023
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- Critic Score
There’s brilliance here, but it’s when the album slows down that it becomes transcendent.- The Independent (UK)
- Posted Feb 20, 2020
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- The Independent (UK)
- Posted Feb 17, 2012
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- Critic Score
All 10 tracks are stacked with hooks, making it as good as their 2009 breakthrough album, Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix. ... Mars’s sophisticated stream-of-consciousness lyrics operate in perfect synchronicity with the album’s sound. Melancholy themes of mortality are balanced by a giddy commitment to seizing the dance floor moment.- The Independent (UK)
- Posted Nov 3, 2022
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