The Observer (UK)'s Scores

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For 2,617 reviews, this publication has graded:
  • 37% higher than the average critic
  • 4% same as the average critic
  • 59% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 4.9 points lower than other critics. (0-100 point scale)
Average Music review score: 68
Highest review score: 100 Gold-Diggers Sound
Lowest review score: 20 Collections
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 1,231 out of 2617
  2. Mixed: 1,368 out of 2617
  3. Negative: 18 out of 2617
2617 music reviews
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    • 88 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Letter to You
    In truth, Letter to You is cheesier than a Monterey Jack, shameless in its embrace of cliche. ... Conversely, then, Letter to You is exactly the album some people could use right now, a sledgehammer of succour and uplift, a heroic E Street pile-on of the kind fans and guitarist Steve Van Zandt have been lobbying for, for years.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    No Home Record
    These punishing, three-dimensional soundscapes connect 70s No Wave with the mischievous end of contemporary digital production: quite a feat.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    The Worse Things Get, the Harder I Fight, the Harder I Fight, the More I Love You
    The closing Ragtime offers a happy ending of sorts, but this is too honest a record about unhappiness and grief to deliver a neat, redemptive conclusion.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Tribute to Ndiouga Dieng
    Old-school Africa at its finest.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Tempo
    There are thrills galore for fans of the Knife and Róisín Murphy (like Murphy’s Hairless Toys, Tempo is inspired by ball culture documentary Paris Is Burning), and nagging hooks too.
    • 87 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    V
    It makes for their most cohesive album yet.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Piano & A Microphone 1983
    It’s an intensely intimate experience, appropriately voyeuristic and transgressive for a songwriter who wrote about both things so well. The versions of Prince’s better-known songs may disappoint some--Purple Rain is a meandering snippet--but what stays with you is the sense of talent, hardening to genius.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Goin' Platinum!
    A lush, teak-panelled Nashville soul record.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    False Idols
    I'm Ready, on which that familiar sprechgesang delivery is somehow both metronomic and distended, is exemplary, but the whole record--dosed with menace --sounds hungry.
    • 71 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Beak 2
    It makes for a record that's heroically uncommercial, but hypnotic nonetheless.
    • 87 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Plunge
    Fever Ray’s first new music in eight years finds Karin Dreijer (she seems to have lost the Andersson) in fierce form.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Colores
    Aware that any language barrier can be overcome by a plethora of hooks and a prevailing atmosphere, Balvin adds a playful embellishment to each of the album’s 10 tracks, be it Amarillo’s kazoo-assisted beat, or the twinkling glacial percussion that tickles closer Blanco. A riot not just of colour, but of ideas too.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    The Longest River
    An enchanting, stately creation.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Aromanticism
    Sumney has described the album as “a sonic dreamscape” and if Aromanticism has a tiny drawback, it is an over-reliance on beauty.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Suspiria [Original Motion Picture Soundtrack]
    It’s to Yorke’s credit that the sense of foreboding he conjures, whether in the discordant Volk or the more elegant Olga’s Destruction (Volk Tape), manages to be so evocative even without Guadagnino’s visuals.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Replica
    By turns eerie and starkly beautiful, Replica rewards repeated listening.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Live in Paris
    Live albums often undersell their artist, but this proves an inviting, well-judged showcase.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Country Hustle
    A captivating, low-key set from a singular talent.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Black Metal 2
    Songs instantly familiar yet utterly unknowable.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Wide Awake!
    Wide Awake! might be too scattershot to appeal to a much wider audience, but it does cement Parquet Courts’ position as one of US indie’s more intriguing outliers.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Banga
    Banga is the 65-year-old's 11th album, one of the most satisfying of her latterday career.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Hallelujah Anyhow
    Every song possesses passion and gravitas, making Hallelujah Anyhow a spiritual descendant of Van Morrison’s Veedon Fleece.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Heart like a Levee
    Happy Day (Sister My Sister) has the languid swing of the Band, Like a Mirror Loves a Hammer feels like a classic cut of southern funk. But this is much more than an exercise in loving hommage, not least because his lyrics brim with personality and feeling.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Ruminations
    The rediscovered intimacy suits him--there’s a bracing directness to these songs that’s been lacking over the last decade.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Through Water
    The palette of sounds she draws from on the long-awaited, and largely self-incubated, follow-up is familiar. ... She saves the most affecting song for last, Speaking of the End making its mark with just understated piano and her unadorned voice.
    • 93 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    One Foot in Front of the Other [Mixtape]
    Given that these songs are really, really good, you pity the competition when Griff: The Opus finally lands.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Fresh Blood
    Fresh Blood refines the Spacebomb MO, darkening themes and expanding their range.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Hot Dreams
    This Canadian trio dispense a slow, seductive blend of blues and country that skulks in the shadows, whispering sweet nothings before baring its fangs.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Black Girl Magic
    Black Girl Magic finds Dijon expanding her sound to incorporate a wider range of queer Black contributions to dancefloor culture, producing a 15-track masterclass in disco, new jack swing and soulful house.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Landlord
    Landlord is fantastic, crafted, big-stage trap with the lissom, conversational feel of a mixtape.
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