Paste Magazine's Scores

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For 4,071 reviews, this publication has graded:
  • 67% higher than the average critic
  • 3% same as the average critic
  • 30% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 3 points higher than other critics. (0-100 point scale)
Average Music review score: 76
Highest review score: 100 Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band [50th Anniversary Edition Deluxe Version]
Lowest review score: 10 Songs From Black Mountain
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 3,635 out of 4071
  2. Mixed: 400 out of 4071
  3. Negative: 36 out of 4071
4071 music reviews
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    • 62 Metascore
    • 49 Critic Score
    What Lasts
    Sadly, this album gets bogged down in hollow harmonies and filler songs that merely scrape the surface of emotion.
    • 70 Metascore
    • 59 Critic Score
    Further
    A few gems, sure, but Further doesn't fly far enough.
    • 68 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    We Are Born
    Sia's ostensible rebirth falls apart once We Are Born detours to bleak balladry with I'm In Here, a pale imitation of her big claim to fame.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Grace Potter & the Nocturnals
    There are hints of the band's previous life here--"Oasis" seems to strikes the roots-pop balance they're going for, and "Goodbye Kiss" is perfectly fine barroom reggae--and Potter rarely misses a chance to show off her killer voice, but The Nocturnals' crucial swagger has sadly been scrubbed clean away.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 55 Critic Score
    Forgiveness Rock Record
    Whereas BSS' two previous albums indulge the group's pop sensibilities while showcasing its knack for rock anthems, Forgiveness cremates and scatters these strengths over an intimidating and overwrought runtime.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Trans-Continental Hustle
    It seems Gogol Bordello is still stubbornly clutching for the inventiveness of earlier records like Gypsy Punks: Underdog World Strike and Super Taranta! without truly progressing, leaving us with a Rick Rubin-adorned imitation of their visionary past work.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Volume Two
    The smiling-through-tears undercurrent of ’60s pop is lost in Deschanel’s taffy-like vocals, and though the album evokes memories of a more pleasant time, they seem far too sweet to be real.
    • 67 Metascore
    • 48 Critic Score
    Tomorrow, In A Year
    The concept was ambitious but, unfortunately, in releasing Tomorrow as an album, the team divorces the music from the stage and leaves the songs stranded in a mire of effects and noise.
    • 68 Metascore
    • 42 Critic Score
    Hands
    Little Boots’ problem may be that there’s little left to add to her genre: The synth-pop revival has nearly exhausted itself, and Hands ends up sounding like a B-sides collection cherry-picked from the catalogs of Kylie Minogue and Girls Aloud.
    • 71 Metascore
    • 57 Critic Score
    The Open Road
    Hiatt puts these thoughts to paper in his signature cerebral style, but it isn’t enough to make these played-out themes feel fresh.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 59 Critic Score
    Magic Chairs
    The album struggles at times to raise its head from the multi-instrumental pack; textured as it is, there’s a muted quality to this collection that inevitably leaves ears slightly cold. It’s pretty, but not always gripping.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 48 Critic Score
    Life Is Sweet! Nice To Meet You
    But the overproduction and studio gimmickry haunts the halls of this collegiate rock, constraining Hynes’ squeaky-clean instrumentation between alternating tedium and banality.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 51 Critic Score
    Crows
    Crows isn’t without merit—Moorer’s voice is beautiful, and the themes are on an emotional canvas that anyone over 13 with a normal amount of chromosomes has experienced, making her album relatable if not particularly memorable.
    • 70 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Ultraviolet
    The album is undeniably solid, so why does it feel faintly underwhelming? Context is key.
    • 68 Metascore
    • 49 Critic Score
    Midwinter Graces
    Amos fails to find an entryway into these songs that justifies her willingness to bury her personality inside them, ending up with a well-meaning but ultimately inessential vanity project.
    • 54 Metascore
    • 57 Critic Score
    Play On
    On Play On her approach results in a scattershot collection that too often mistakes bombast for sincerity ('Unapologize') and sap for sentiment ('Temporary Home').
    • 76 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Escape 2 Mars
    Even with Gab’s phonetic prowess and all that time to prepare for launch, Escape 2 Mars doesn’t reach the transcendent heights of its sublime, lushly orchestrated predecessor, ultimately feeling less like an epic interplanetary voyage and more like space camp.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Cosmic Egg
    Much of Cosmic Egg is just that--not-quite-hatched, and in need of sharper claws.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 41 Critic Score
    I Told You I Was Freaky
    As much of Freaky wallows in the jokes, the record runs out of ideas astonishingly early.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 48 Critic Score
    Geneva
    Ultimately, Russian Circles pummel too politely.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Wildlife
    The well-established indie-pop tricks get results, but are too unerringly calculated to have much distinct personality. Some big, billowy production would have helped.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Revolution
    On songs like these, she resists the temptation to play the spurned frontierswoman out for revenge. She’s a little wounded, a little scared, a little less of a caricature and a little more human.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Be Set Free
    These are mediocre, and sometimes painfully inept, approximations of classic lovelorn folk tunes. At a short 38 minutes, the times aren’t changin’ fast enough.
    • 70 Metascore
    • 52 Critic Score
    The Boy Who Knew Too Much
    By the time the pop-induced sugar rush wears off you realize that, besides being done before, these songs have definitely been done better. Worse yet, all you've got to show for it is a headache.
    • 62 Metascore
    • 53 Critic Score
    Draw The Line
    British singer/songwriter David Gray last released a proper studio album in 2005. It was called "Life in Slow Motion," and it was lovely. It was also a complete waste of that title, which could be far more accurately applied to his syrupy new LP Draw the Line.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Backspacer
    Outside of a filmic context and stamped with the name Pearl Jam, several of the songs fall flat, dragging down an otherwise upbeat and enjoyable release.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 51 Critic Score
    The Blueprint 3
    Jay overreaches, leaning too heavily on by-the-numbers production from Kanye West and Timbaland, and muffling his own voice in favor of a guest-heavy tracklist.
    • 67 Metascore
    • 59 Critic Score
    Heartbeat Radio
    Prodigiously talented but frustratingly inconsistent, Lerche gives Heartbeat Radio an unsteady pulse.
    • 75 Metascore
    • 42 Critic Score
    After Robots
    Track after track is slathered in layers of horns and guitars and synths until the songs underneath are no longer discernible.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 52 Critic Score
    Blood From Stars
    Levon coaxes an intricately textured tone from his saxophone on 'Over Her Shoulder,' but generally, Joe’s erudition gets the better of him on this strangely dim and twinkleless album.
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