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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    • 63 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    All The Way
    Despite creating some killer drones in '03 and '04, the duo has been in decline for more than two years now, and the trend continues with All the Way.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    L.A.X.
    Somehow, the Game is still coasting on wispy, West Coast–nostalgia fumes--chronic, red rags, lolos, etc.--but the goodwill, at this point, has pretty much exhausted itself.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    A Little Bit Longer
    Too many of these songs get bogged down in chord changes and lyrics likely to sound worn-out even to a 10-year-old.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Waiting For The Sunrise
    If Vandervelde's new set struggles to generate the same charge, maybe that's because it doesn't approach its source material with the same aggression or playfulness.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Como te Llama
    ¿Cómo Te Llama? is best when the songs seem to shake and quaver within their candy-coated shells; fittingly, that’s when they’re at their Strokes-iest.
    • 67 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Fire Songs
    Fire Songs isn't a masterpiece, but it's in the right ZIP code.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Viva La Vida
    When the pastoral Eno flourishes that started Vida off so promisingly return for a quick coda, Martin reverts back to his suavely crooning self, but blows it with his first four words: "And in the end . . . . " Bam, you're thinking 'Abbey Road,' and while Vida is far from a dog, it's just another unflattering comparison that the record itself needlessly invites--an extremely overconfident way to handle a crisis of confidence.
    • 52 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Rise And Fall, Rage And Grace
    The patchwork of styles thrown around here distracts you from the album's strengths.
    • 67 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Diamond Hoo Ha
    Now Diamond Hoo Ha, find Supergrass mired in a sort of stasis. We always knew the lads were limited to just three chords; with efforts that feel measured, contrived, and dawdling, they finally sound like it.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Here I Stand
    A little too sitting-on-the-dock-of-the-bay for Chris Breezy–trained earbuds, perhaps, Here I Stand is pure grown-man bidness.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Welcome
    The result is impressive genre prowess--especially when he invites Austin unknown Deon Davis (a/k/a Element 7d) to contribute some post-rap boogie on 'Crystal Lite,' or rips off Wham’s 'Everything She Wants' on 'I Choose You'--but Pants might still be flexing prematurely.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Narrow Stairs
    It's their mediocre album.
    • 47 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Brooklyn's Don Diva
    Take Foxy Brown's (belated) fourth album, Brooklyn's Don Diva, as the latest missed opportunity.
    • 75 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    H.N.I.C. Pt. 2
    The Mobb Deep don sounds beyond frayed, barely restraining his byzantine gangster paranoia while scratching out his own self-convinced logic evoking both grief and menace.
    • 67 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    From The Valley To The Stars
    Serene but emotionally flat, Valley feels like too much church on a cold Sunday afternoon.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Ghosts I-IV
    It's basically a minimalist record that coasts on one's predilection for NINoise.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Walk It Off
    Problem is, Walk It Off is recorded like a single, 45-minute Big Event, rendering the alleged omniharp, tubular bells, and timpani mere liner-note abstractions.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Do It!
    Do It! is the first Clinic record that seems assembled from bits of old Clinic records, its personality the result of combined ideas rather than new ones.
    • 54 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Mail On Sunday
    The result is so robotic in its attempt to jolt every single pleasure center every single second that any twist of human joy, lust, awareness, or reflection is assimilated into its brittle, crunky Borg cube.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    The Odd Couple
    A hastily crafted follow-up, a subpar sequel, much more "Rocky V" than "The Godfather: Part II."
    • 68 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Too Old To Die Young
    Too Old to Die Young is a fully plugged-in affair that expands on the muscular sighs of its predecessor and ups the rhythmic ante.
    • 60 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Trilla
    Like any good corporate-mandated sequel, it reprises the strengths of its original product with as little variation as possible, to predictably diminished returns.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    In The Future
    Too quick and severe on the brakes, Black Mountain stunt their own grandiosity in the name of dynamics or patience.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    The Portrait Is Finished & I Have Failed To Capture Your Beauty...
    Together, they craft lilting, light-hearted art-folk that recalls something akin to Joni Mitchell sitting in with '80s British popsters Prefab Sprout at best, or some Renaissance Faire troubadour's best attempt at improv at its most mediocre.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Shelter From The Ash
    Shelter doesn't settle into one sound--which is fine--but it's never able to harness its manic energy into anything coherent.
    • 59 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Motown: A Journey Through Hitsville USA
    Hitsville's unrelenting smoothness verges on kitsch and quickly becomes grating.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Good Apollo, I'm Burning Star IV, Volume Two: No World For Tomorrow
    Overall, the songs are weaker than before--too many feel cheesy, bland, half-baked.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    The Alchemy Index Vols. I and II: Fire and Water
    Some of the sound makes for gorgeous fury.... But a little concision--and a bit of Pete Wentz's tune sense--would've gone a long way.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Random Spirit Lover
    Lover's defects stem less from long length than from how densely Krug packs each nervous tic.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Cease To Begin
    With 10 tracks adding up to a mere 34 minutes, this follow-up is much more wan and insubstantial than its predecessor.
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