Village Voice's Scores

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For 764 reviews, this publication has graded:
  • 47% higher than the average critic
  • 3% same as the average critic
  • 50% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 5.1 points lower than other critics. (0-100 point scale)
Average Music review score: 68
Highest review score: 100 The Naked Truth
Lowest review score: 10 God Says No
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 517 out of 764
  2. Mixed: 199 out of 764
  3. Negative: 48 out of 764
764 music reviews
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    • 67 Metascore
    • 30 Critic Score
    Songbird
    [It] feels more like record label franchise building--"And let's get Willie to sing a Grateful Dead song!" "Cool!"--than an actual, like, album.
    • 71 Metascore
    • 30 Critic Score
    Creature Comforts
    On their directionless new Creature Comforts, Black Dice seem confused, in fact, about what precisely their aesthetic is.
    • 60 Metascore
    • 30 Critic Score
    American Life
    The title track's having-it-all exhaustion, underscored by its bipolar sonics and start-stop rhythms, will endear her to the Allison Pearson crowd; a few other tunes will reinforce her fan base among fellow whiny celebrities.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 30 Critic Score
    Hopes And Fears
    Strangely: no guitar, only piano. Which, strangely, doesn't make them sound any more romantic, nor does it add interest to the other songs, which are either too slow, too genre, or too lyrically distracting.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 30 Critic Score
    Under Rug Swept
    I'm just not sure that pop music should come out of a thesaurus.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 30 Critic Score
    Honkin' On Bobo
    This suspicious move into another moribund genre resembles the frustrated strivings of a band uncertain of how to exist After Rock.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 30 Critic Score
    Devils & Dust
    It's long and boring and preachy.
    • 75 Metascore
    • 30 Critic Score
    Era Vulgaris
    With the band sounding listless and drained of ideas, it starts trying anything.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 30 Critic Score
    Some Cities
    Bogged in reverb tanks, delays, and other swirly effects, Some Cities' production masks their slovenly musicianship.
    • 52 Metascore
    • 30 Critic Score
    Bat Out Of Hell III: The Monster Is Loose
    The Diane Warren and Desmond Child faux-Steinman stuff is far worse, but the inescapable message of Bat III is that even Meat's former partner hasn't been at peak strength for at least a decade.
    • 70 Metascore
    • 30 Critic Score
    The Empire Strikes First
    A bore of an album.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 20 Critic Score
    St. Anger
    Songs like "Frantic," "Dirty Window," and even the balladesque "Sweet Amber" stop and start, cut to pieces by groove-robbing edits that replace the guitar harmonies on which Metallica built an industry.
    • 49 Metascore
    • 20 Critic Score
    Chocolate Starfish and the Hot Dog Flavored Water
    On the whole, Chocolate Starfish and the Hot Dog Flavored Water feels like an interminable groan, a harried hustle toward obsolescence. Rather than creating a cathartic requiem for, say, the impending dotcom depression, this turgid non-effort doesn't even live up to the mookish reputation refuted with such salacious fervor on "Take a Look Around."
    • 70 Metascore
    • 20 Critic Score
    By The Way
    Kiedis's lyrics are absolutely baffling.
    • 71 Metascore
    • 20 Critic Score
    Brother Is To Son
    The first few minutes sound like very early David Bowie without Mick Ronson, electricity, or songs. The rest is so annoying that after 15 minutes you'll fondly remember grade-school sing-alongs and eating paste during arts-and-crafts.
    • 60 Metascore
    • 20 Critic Score
    The Adventures Of Ghosthorse And Stillborn
    Once they could juggle being both captivating and grating. Today, they're just the latter.
    • 67 Metascore
    • 10 Critic Score
    God Says No
    The new Monster Magnet album is kinda crappy, and they'd better check themselves before they quite irrevocably wreck themselves.
    • 50 Metascore
    • 10 Critic Score
    Lost And Found
    The lamest album that'll be released this year.
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