Slant Magazine's Scores

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For 3,122 reviews, this publication has graded:
  • 35% higher than the average critic
  • 3% same as the average critic
  • 62% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 7.7 points lower than other critics. (0-100 point scale)
Average Music review score: 65
Highest review score: 100 Who Kill
Lowest review score: 0 Fireflies
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 1,692 out of 3122
  2. Mixed: 1,319 out of 3122
  3. Negative: 111 out of 3122
3122 music reviews
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    • 54 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Strange Folk
    Even if Kula Shaker never transcend their vintage influences, it's on the dreamier songs like the title track and 'Persephone' (billed as a bonus track, a move that's antiquated in its own right) that Strange Folk stands as an unexpectedly welcome comeback.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Sleep Through The Static
    Sleep Through the Static is yet another collection of somnolent, semi-sociopolitical-themed folk-rock in the tradition of '70s AM radio.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Pocketful of Sunshine
    Despite some attempts at quasi-uplift ('Freckles') and childhood nostalgia ('Backyard'), there's little here that's likely to reprise the slow-burning success of that inspirational smash ['Unwritten'].
    • 76 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Angels Of Destruction
    Overproduction, unfortunately, doesn't fully account for its flaws. Too many of the songs invoke heavy-handed spiritual imagery.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Growing Pains
    She keeps her most salable characteristic, her emotiveness, under duress, which provides tension but no release.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Alone: The Home Recordings of Rivers Cuomo
    For a collection of lo-fi home demos, Rivers Cuomo's Alone, in its better moments, sure does sound at times like a return to form.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    8 Diagrams
    The formula ain't broken and it occasionally still cracks with some of that old pharmaceutical majesty.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    The Boatlift
    For better or worse, the story of Boatlift concerns more the production and song structures than Pitbull's own rapping.
    • 67 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Jordin Sparks
    Jordin Sparks is one of the strongest Idol debuts yet.
    • 53 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Taking Chances
    The laborious 16-track record purportedly finds the queen of adult contemporary-turned-Vegas attraction taking chances by modernizing her treacly power ballad sound with lots of overdubbed guitars and of-the-moment collaborators.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    System
    Price's remix work has always been more impressive than his original productions and System is no exception.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Sawdust
    Sawdust will still fill in the void for fans--to which the album is dedicated, natch--while they wait for a new LP.
    • 69 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Exclusive
    There's still nothing very "exclusive" about Exclusive at all.
    • 61 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Blackout
    For every hot, of-the-moment track, though, there's something like the nonsensical 'Hot As Ice,' which was co-penned by the thoroughly talentless T-Pain and might have worked two albums ago but just sounds retrograde here.
    • 60 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Long Road Out Of Eden
    They're proving that they're still commercially relevant, but the calculated, tepid Long Road Out of Eden isn't likely to influence another generation of musicians.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Chrome Dreams II
    It's a return to a time when Young albums felt like ingenious mixtapes--where Crazy Horse tracks, Stray Gators tracks, and duets with Linda Rondstadt intermingled without being jarring in the least.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Carnival Ride
    Carnival Ride simply doesn't offer anything for the unconverted in terms of Underwood's growth either as a vocalist or as an artist.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Oblivion With Bells
    It clearly meshes with their previous incarnations and eventually emerges as a listenable album in its own right.
    • 50 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Necessary Evil
    The pastiche of styles on Necessary Evil is quintessential Debbie Harry, but diamonds in the rough aside, it also makes for a wildly uneven, often jarring collection of songs.
    • 52 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Brave
    If the album builds up a nice head of steam all the way up to the double-time wall of sound that is 'The Way It Is,' the problem is it's not necessarily Lopez's head of steam.
    • 68 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Songs Of Mass Destruction
    Mass Destruction is Lennox's first album largely recorded in the U.S. (Los Angeles and Miami, as opposed to just London), giving the songs a slightly less chilly quality and a bigger, more expansive sound, but it's still a disappointment in the same way the Eurythmics' rock-leaning "Be Yourself Tonight" likely was to fans of "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)" and "Touch."
    • 69 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Smokey Rolls Down Thunder Canyon
    On Smokey Rolls Down Thunder Canyon, however, Banhart comes across as an attention whore; the mannered, look-what-I-can-do kook act overshadows his actual talent.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Washington Square Serenade
    Earle racks up more wins than losses on Washington Square Serenade, but while the high points are in line with his best work, he didn't dispose of his excess baggage before the move.
    • 60 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Songs About Girls
    will.i.am's lyrics are almost appallingly bad enough to retract my impending endorsement of the album.
    • 70 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    In Our Bedroom After The War
    'The Night Starts Here' is the kind of boy-girl baton-song that's become a signature for the band, with Campbell and Millan trading verses while we play analysts, and though this one is sufficiently cinematic and electro-psychedelic, it's not quite 'Your Ex-Lover is Dead.'
    • 72 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    In Our Nature
    These songs are never less than lovely, but they're never really more than lovely either.
    • 66 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Go Go Smear The Poison Ivy
    Go Go Smear the Poison Ivy--though a significant step up from their last album--doesn't break much new ground.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    The Real Thing: Words And Sounds Vol. 3
    The Real Thing isn't exactly a step down from the last volume, 2004's "Beautifully Human," but it's conceptually even less diverse, which makes it her weakest album to date.
    • 53 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    All The Lost Souls
    James Blunt returns with All the Lost Souls, a more piano-driven period piece that's about as edgy as an episode of "Desperate Housewives."
    • 72 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Spirit If...
    When Drew tones down his approach on tracks like 'Safety Bricks' and 'Gang Bang Suicide,' the result is underwhelming and seems to want for additional input.
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