The Wire's Scores
- Music
For 2,617 reviews, this publication has graded:
-
51% higher than the average critic
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7% same as the average critic
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42% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 0.6 points higher than other critics.
(0-100 point scale)
Average Music review score: 73
Highest review score: | Spiderland [Box Set] | |
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Lowest review score: | Amazing Grace |
Score distribution:
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Positive: 2,167 out of 2617
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Mixed: 430 out of 2617
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Negative: 20 out of 2617
2617
music
reviews
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- Critic Score
A good bit stranger-sounding and more interesting in their excavation of the past. [Jul 2017, p.53]- The Wire
Posted Aug 8, 2017 -
- Critic Score
Part of Souleyman’s thing is upsetting delicate ears with his so-called vulgarity – it’s music for taxi drivers and party crashers. Likewise these swooning synth stabs may sound kitsch to discerning ravers, but the fun is heroically nonstop. [Jan 2020, p.69]- The Wire
Posted Dec 9, 2019 -
- The Wire
Posted Dec 16, 2015 -
- Critic Score
With the stylistic anchor lifted, the 12 cuts sound progressively more deranged as they blossom into alien dance floor mutants from bubbles of heady synths, deliriously processed voices, absurd squiggles and reversed beats. ... It’s difficult to imagine a better debut for ex-DFA head Jonathan Galkin’s new imprint FourFour. [Nov 2021, p.48]- The Wire
Posted Dec 20, 2021 -
- Critic Score
While several guests appear on the album – Tool’s drummer Danny Carey and bassist Justin Chancellor, among others – Krüller feels gorgeously desolate, befitting a world in a dire state. [Mar 2022, p.42]- The Wire
Posted Mar 30, 2022 -
- Critic Score
Out of a dangerous, pitfall-laden area of song, she makes a variety of riches. [Jun 2015, p.48]- The Wire
Posted Jun 5, 2015 -
- Critic Score
What's distinctive about Son is that it is more layered and inventive than Segundo and Tres Cosas. [#268, p.58]- The Wire
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- Critic Score
The risky juxtapositions that mark his best work are critically missing. [#224, p.51]- The Wire
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- Critic Score
Downhome and earthy, cut through with sensitivity and intelligence. [#229, p.58]- The Wire
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- The Wire
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- Critic Score
Sometimes Liars sounds like a group whose previous sonic journeying has inspired a fresh look at the familiar. All too often, however, it's as though, having stepped outside the confines of conventional song, they can never believe in it enough to return. [Sep 2007, p.56]- The Wire
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- Critic Score
Sol Invictus is a looser, more relaxed record than its predecessors, occasionally dropping into a lounge ballad mode that suits Patton's vocals. [Jun 2015, p.52]- The Wire
Posted Jun 5, 2015 -
- Critic Score
Most of this material has a tense, enervating effect, despite the haziness of the sonic palette Field-Pickering favours. [Feb 2013, p.60]- The Wire
Posted Feb 28, 2013 -
- Critic Score
Daze's exhilarating intensity is tempered by an undercurrent of grim pleasure in physical discomfort, worming under your skin like Tri Angle labelmate Rabit's similarly caustic "Pandemic." [Feb 2016, p.53]- The Wire
Posted Feb 18, 2016 -
- Critic Score
With this score, Greenwood might have set out in the footsteps of the masters, but he ends up forging his own path. [Jan 2015, p.64]- The Wire
Posted Feb 4, 2015 -
- Critic Score
The dryness of the recording is key, there’s an intimacy to everything that makes even the heaviest moments (“Skin A Rat”) feel like you’re hearing them in a dead room, and the shifts in tone from the punchy (“Sorry Entertainer”) to the plangent (“The Greatest”, “Tried To Understand”) and the gorgeous chorale-like (“Feminine Water Turmoil”) remain utterly convincing thanks to Ashworth’s miraculous voice. [May 2022, p.55]- The Wire
Posted Apr 26, 2022 -
- Critic Score
What unites them is the boldness of the material and their treatment of it. [Jun 2014, p.48]- The Wire
Posted Jul 14, 2014 -
- Critic Score
No one, really, has taken their precise marriage of classic rock 'n' roll moves and steely cybernetic deformity further than themselves. [Aug 2014, p.53]- The Wire
Posted Aug 27, 2014 -
- Critic Score
This analogy of applying interdisciplinary approaches to uncover a certain reality carries through to several aspects of the album, where a folding over of electronic and acoustic space circles in on and augments a broader understanding of sound. [Aug 2018, p.67]- The Wire
Posted Jul 26, 2018 -
- Critic Score
The eight pieces here function as a drummer’s showcase, certainly, but Contact’s wilful limitations conceal an eclectic approach. ... Time spent immersed in Contact will reap reward. [May 2020, p.52]- The Wire
Posted Jun 11, 2020 -
- Critic Score
The ten tracks are built on foundations of looped percussion and tight bass sequences, usually based around short, sharp and undeclarative sounds – synthetic rimshots and damped hi-hats rather than snares or kicks. While this can run into staid territory, as on the triphop shuffle of “One Two”, for the most part its subdued hardness accents the drift of Milton’s vocals. His delivery often overwhelms the matter of his lyrics in the best way. [Apr 2021, p.54]- The Wire
Posted Apr 9, 2021 -
- Critic Score
To these ears at least, Rundgren’s finest since 2008’s Arena. [Jan 2023, p.75]- The Wire
Posted Dec 19, 2022 -
- Critic Score
One of the chief sources of the album's power is the value it assigns to the act of witnessing, of seeing and taking account of the most vulnerable. [Apr 2016, p.47]- The Wire
Posted Mar 29, 2016 -
- Critic Score
Several tracks differ little from versions on their 1987 Flying Nun debut Brave Worlds, but the instrumental rarity "Moonlight On Flesh" brings a welcome expansiveness redolent of a more modest Echo And The Bunnyman. [Dec 2014, p.57]- The Wire
Posted Dec 16, 2014 -
- Critic Score
93696 is their sixth to date and, in many ways, it still sounds like music made to illustrate a theory. [Apr 2023, p.56]- The Wire
Posted Mar 22, 2023 -
- Critic Score
The desire of the group to progress feels palpable here. [Nov 2015, p.55]- The Wire
Posted Dec 16, 2015 -
- Critic Score
Many of Mike’s verses lost me, but when it clicks, and you can follow a thought through a few mutating bars, the effect is astonishing. [Aug 2021, p.58]- The Wire
Posted Jul 28, 2021 -
- Critic Score
A highlty nuanced album which is at once razor sharp, and rich in new openings and possibilities. [#206, p.60]- The Wire
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- Critic Score
He rationalizes the darkness of Trauma with the breeze and bounce of 1998's Rhythmalism, and the results are often downright hilarious. [Jun 2011, p.60]- The Wire
Posted Aug 12, 2011 -
- Critic Score
Somehow unconvincing, it's like beach bar escapism spliced with an incidental tune from the TV comedy show The Mighty Boosh. [Mar 2015, p.60]- The Wire
Posted Mar 25, 2015