The overriding feeling is that this is a remarkable piece of self-indulgence rather than anything you would want to, I don't know, ever listen to. [Oct/Nov 2012, p.133]

For much of Fasciination, it’s the music that keeps the record afloat, because, even at his very best, singer Tim Fink doesn’t have much to say. [Summer 2008]

The listener is left with a couple handfuls of mid-tempo ballads that fail to even qualify as guilty pleasures. [May 2011, p.88]

Vulnerable has a cheap sound and a cut and paste feel from beginning to end and is hard to shake. [#5, p.110]

The brashness of the band's seminal debut is gone, and what's left is a band that seems to have rushed an album out only in order to get back on stage to try to make it interesting. [Spring 2009, p.79]

For the most parts, it drags. [Aug-Sep 2013, p.92]

Welcome to Goon Island never seems to find dry land. [Winter 2008]

Unfortunately, they're not quite tall enough yet to ride the same coaster as Editors, much less Interpol, much, much less Joy Division.

Safe and uninspired.... This is the type of MOR impulse buy that will eventually pollute used-CD bins everywhere across the world. [#13, p.93]

Coldplay's seventh album A Head Full of Dreams is insufferably bland at best and downright offensive at worst.

It's Morrissey's weakened, diminished lyricism that kicks it down from being a solid-if-not-stunning Moz record to something almost unpalatable.

An ugly mess. [#11, p.116]

Yeah Ghost is simply too experimental. [Fall 2009, p.74]

The Endless River belongs not in the pantheon of the great Pink Floyd, but in a hotel elevator.

The whole endeavor feels like a joke set-up with no punchline. The Teal Album's greatest sin is it is neither the best nor worst version of itself and by being so overwhelming mediocre, it renders itself completely pointless. It is essentially musical copypasta.

Thieves are excellent hijackers, but you could just pick up a New Order or Joy Division album for a more authentic experience.

Remastering the songs doesn't take away the superfluous guitar tracks. "All Around the World" is still nine minutes and 20 seconds long. "My Big Mouth" still sounds like it belongs on a Beady Eye album.

They reportedly had some difficulties securing a label for this release. And Unfortunately, it's easy to see why; Girls hits the panic button pretty early on. [Jul 2011, p.78]

The snarky, ironic title only seems to poke fun at what is Daft Punk's most programmed and artificial album to date, and this is just a part of what feels like an all in-joke record. [#9]

YOKOKIMTHURSTON is an improvisational cluster that has no beginning and no end, and no plot to keep listeners on the track to redemption. [Aug/Sep 2012, p.113]

Raditude is just the latest and fullest articulation of Cuomo's wincingly sad desire to become a mainstream success, [Holiday, 2009, p.79]

Loud Like Love is sadly a chugging bore. [Aug-Sep 2013, p.93]

David takes the album title's sentiment to heart to such a degree, every song sounds like a cover version of whatever transient entries are currently topping the charts.

More often than not, Michael Grubbs' painfully bland vocals cause the whole thing to come crashing back to earth. [Winter 2010, p.72]

The directionless album may have a number of songs that will make radio programmers drool, but the staying power resembles anything but a classic.

The Time Of The Assassins feels like the work a of a decent high school band who had tons of money for studio time. [Winter 2009, p.73]

It’s a concept album that fundamentally refuses to engage with its own premise. Instead, the band doubles down on lyrical clichés about love and arena-friendly electropop. ... Frontman Chris Martin was never known as a brilliant songwriter, but his lyrics were never this vapid either.

It's not easy to describe what's going on here, if one can even figure it out anyway.