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The Magic Image
Metascore
79

Generally favorable reviews - based on 20 Critic Reviews What's this?

User Score
7.8

Generally favorable reviews- based on 17 Ratings

  • Summary: The latest release for the experimental rock band was recorded in seven days in an abandoned office space in New Mexico.
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Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 17 out of 20
  2. Negative: 0 out of 20
  1. Jun 24, 2016
    91
    The Magic, the band’s aptly named 13th album, is the loosest, most expansive Deerhoof LP in some years.
  2. Jun 22, 2016
    90
    Otherworldly and full of enchantment, Deerhoof's 13th studio album, The Magic, finds the wholly original and ever-engaging band at their most cohesive and versatile.
  3. Jun 20, 2016
    80
    They’re weird. Wired. Wonderful. They sound like no one but themselves, and they’re still getting better.
  4. Uncut
    Jun 20, 2016
    80
    It all hangs together, propelled by a sense of fun that, 22 years on, still pervades every note. Trot on. [Jul 2016, p.73]
  5. Jul 15, 2016
    80
    Ever-evolving they may be, but Satomi’s oddball pop songs are another band staple; this time they deliver the cutesy, punky, and thoroughly entertaining Nurse Me.
  6. Jun 22, 2016
    70
    Yet aside from the variety exhibited when the jazzy futurism of “Model Behavior” gives way to the anthemic grandstanding of “Learning to Apologize Effectively”, it’s surprising just how vintage some of the music on the album sounds.
  7. Jun 20, 2016
    55
    There's no escaping a diminishing ability to knock listeners to the floor.

See all 20 Critic Reviews

Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 1 out of 1
  2. Mixed: 0 out of 1
  3. Negative: 0 out of 1
  1. Sep 25, 2016
    9
    Experimental music classics, Deerhoof, come up with a trully whimsical piece of their collective work and imagination. It's sometimes a bit ofExperimental music classics, Deerhoof, come up with a trully whimsical piece of their collective work and imagination. It's sometimes a bit of a challenge to ear Deerhoof songs, because their explosive experimental sound may, sometimes, face a musical barrier in people, but with The Magic, "magically" they destroy that barrier, and their music sounds as better as they could ever get. Expand