Boston Globe's Scores

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For 2,093 reviews, this publication has graded:
  • 66% higher than the average critic
  • 3% same as the average critic
  • 31% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 0.6 points lower than other critics. (0-100 point scale)
Average Music review score: 72
Highest review score: 100 City of Refuge
Lowest review score: 10 Lulu
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 1,670 out of 2093
  2. Mixed: 412 out of 2093
  3. Negative: 11 out of 2093
2093 music reviews
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    • 60 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Strangeland
    Frontman Tom Chaplin continues to imbue it all with freshness and wonder making Strangeland an inviting place.
    • 60 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Trilla
    There are too many throwaway songs and guests (Nelly?), but Ross can still expose all the thrills of Miami vice.
    • 60 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Songs About Girls
    Mostly, this rubbery, hit-laden set follows the blueprint of his recent production work and the BEP's music. He has become a supreme craftsman of pop-funk fluff with little on its mind beyond keeping the party going.
    • 60 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    This Kind Of Love
    Her voice is huskier, veined with the fine lines of age, but that only enhances the sultry sound of the Vineyard's favorite songbird.
    • 60 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    I Can Spin a Rainbow
    I Can Spin a Rainbow finds her bouncing ideas off of the Legendary Pink Dots’ Edward Ka-Spel, whose aggressively experimental approach to what a song can entail is so specific and unyielding that the album forces her into new modes.
    • 60 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    A Head Full of Dreams
    Clearly, the members of Coldplay haven’t completely shaken off their ghosts. But just as clearly, they’ve found joy again in “Dreams.”
    • 59 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Stars Dance
    The whirring Stars Dance is a confident but not aggressively blatant move to a more grown-up pop playing field.
    • 59 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Tides End
    The songs drift between familiar buoys of Echo & the Bunnymen and Simple Minds (with producer Mark Verbos lending more electronic thump than was heard on 2011’s “By the Hedge”), but it’s a tenuous comfort, a listlessness that feels endangered.
    • 59 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Motown: A Journey Through Hitsville USA
    Save the Four Tops medley there has yet to be a match for Levi Stubbs--the Boyz sound as strong and harmonious as ever.
    • 59 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Under The Covers Vol. 2
    Some might fit a little too perfectly, so close to the originals that there doesn’t seem to be much point. But they best serve as reminders about what was so great about them to begin with.
    • 59 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    No Mercy
    It's well crafted, but some of T.I.'s best lines obscure the tracks' fuzzy thinking.
    • 59 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Love to Love You Donna
    While nothing here bests the original tracks--and it is strictly for Summer diehards and remix fans--it’s heartening that artists are still drawing inspiration from a woman who loved it when the music moved people.
    • 59 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    LP1
    On LP1, Stone mostly imbues her songs with passion and energy.
    • 59 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Definition Of Real
    He comes across as a Southern-fried early DMX with his unabated aggression; raw, explosive verse; and hints of conscience.
    • 59 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Echo
    Taking its title a bit too literally, the album sticks to the winning formula that made “Spirit’’ a runaway success. Problem is, we already know these sides of Lewis’s talent.
    • 59 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Love The Future
    Could this really be Chester French's first album? Love the Future sounds too wise--and too catchy--to possibly be the debut from recent Harvard grads D.A. Wallach and Max Drummey
    • 59 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Flamingo
    Flowers feverishly blows up the songs as if they're helium balloons bound for the stratosphere. Any sense of restraint - which, granted, has never been the Killers' specialty - is steamrolled by one bombastic chorus after another.
    • 59 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    I Created Disco
    The bulk of the record follows suit, with straightforward club songs, none too obtuse.
    • 59 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Time
    His music takes the spare depth of Lorde and Tove Lo as a starting point, adding a sharp precision that--along with a floating tenor alternating between a less-sappy Sam Smith and a steelier Jeff Buckley--fuels the tense urgency of “Riot,” and sells even insubstantial material like “Love You Crazy.”
    • 58 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Covers
    Taylor's new collection of covers is a bit of trifle, composed of musical chestnuts recorded with his "Band of Legends" in a 10-day period in a converted barn on Taylor's western Massachusetts property.
    • 58 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Jennifer Hudson
    Despite its flaws, Hudson's debut comes on much like her "Dreamgirls" character, with admirable self-assurance and real-girl sensuality.
    • 58 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Charmed & Strange
    Yoav proves that a guitar and his voice are the only instruments you really need to make powerful, versatile music.
    • 58 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Supermodel
    Supermodel unfurls with bright, sunny melodies that bloom on songs that pick up where its Grammy-nominated debut, “Torches,” left off.
    • 58 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    You and I
    There’s a tremendous amount of preserved intimacy on these unearthed first studio recordings.
    • 58 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Hold on 'Til the Night
    Chance may be too young to understand the complex emotions he writes and sings about, but he sure makes it seem as though he does.
    • 58 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Goodbye Lullaby
    Goodbye Lullaby seems as much about the singer-songwriter's self-examination - she co-wrote all the tracks and is the sole author on many - as about any outward relationships.
    • 58 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    David Archuleta
    Happily, in a genre where the urge is to err on the side of overwrought, someone smart decided to stick with tasteful, understated production. Archuleta's delivery is likewise low-key and attractive, if predictably generic.
    • 58 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Don't Look Down
    Befitting someone who has worked with artists as varied as Dre, Duncan Sheik, and Linkin Park offshoot Fort Minor, Don’t Look Down suits varied moods.
    • 58 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Doggumentary
    The 21-song set, with some misfires, overflows with top-shelf talent; and Snoop's rhymes are crisp and often slightly nostalgic.
    • 58 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Freedom
    This tuneful, seemingly effortless set of sun-kissed pop reminds you why he's in so much demand.
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