The New York Times' Scores

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For 2,072 reviews, this publication has graded:
  • 55% higher than the average critic
  • 4% same as the average critic
  • 41% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 2.2 points lower than other critics. (0-100 point scale)
Average Music review score: 71
Highest review score: 100 Live in Europe 1967: Best of the Bootleg, Vol. 1
Lowest review score: 0 Shatner Claus: The Christmas Album
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 1,594 out of 2072
  2. Mixed: 443 out of 2072
  3. Negative: 35 out of 2072
2072 music reviews
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    • 88 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    folklore
    “Folklore” songs fall into roughly two camps — excellent Swift-penned songs that are sturdy enough to bear the production, and others that end up obscured by murk.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Mr. Morale & The Big Steppers
    It is an album that aims to repel, or if not quite that, then at least is at peace with alienating some of its audience. ... [The album] often feels insular, lyrically and musically. “Mr. Morale” is probably Lamar’s least tonally consistent work. ... Rangy and structurally erratic, full of mid-song beat switches, sorrowful piano and a few moments of dead air.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Daddy's Home
    Clark and her co-producer, Jack Antonoff, have clearly had fun with the creation of this finely tuned alternate universe, but at a point, its many detailed references start to feel like clutter, preventing the songs from moving too freely in their own ways.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Late Registration
    For much of "Late Registration," the striver has turned into a hip-hop V.I.P., and a cool arrogance has crept into the songs. [29 Aug 2005]
    • 85 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Midnights
    Overly familiar sounding and spotty. ... “Midnights” feels like a concession to an older, safer idea of Swift, full of songs that are capable and comfortable but often insufficient. ... Some of the lyrics can be lackluster and bluntly imagistic, with little of the detail that made Swift one of the signature pop songwriters of the 21st century. ... “Midnights” by and large feels like a fuzzy Xerox of old accomplishments.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Jasper County
    This album doesn't always play to her strengths. [13 Sep 2005]
    • The New York Times
    • 84 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    This Is Happening
    This music sounds fantastic, as usual--clean, tight and separated in the mix--but songwriting inspiration is in short supply.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    New Amerykah Part Two: Return of the Ankh
    It’s filled with spacey, leisurely songs about desire, longing, betrayal and letting go. The album plays as one long tease on the way to its last song: the 10-minute, three-part “Out My Mind, Just in Time,” which is even more protracted.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Harry's House
    “Harry’s House” is a light, fun, summery pop record, but there is a gaping void as its center; by its end, the listener is inclined to feel more intimately acquainted with the objects of his affections than the internal world of the titular character himself.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Game Theory
    Black Thought... sounds more focused than he did on the Roots’ last album, “The Tipping Point,” and more engaged than on the one before it, “Phrenology.” But because he’s not the kind of rapper to modulate his emotional pitch, his intensity can level off into monotony.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Blunderbuss
    Few songs on "Blunderbuss" truly knock the wind out of you, as the White Stripes could - even with riffs that were fragmentary, simple or borrowed. This is a songwriter's record, and a kind of orchestrator's record; there's also a new overall vehemence in the lyrics, hammering on dishonesty, jealousy, immorality.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Four the Record
    Normally, she's emphatic in the right places, but this album also includes some of Ms. Lambert's least committed singing.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Broken Social Scene
    Broken Social Scene confuses integrity with indulgence, burying good songs under way too much studio tomfoolery. [10 Oct 2005]
    • 82 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    After Laughter
    She’s still a strong singer, especially on “Told You So,” but some of her essential grit is lost to the machines.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    The Weight of These Wings
    When this album whispers, as it does on large swaths of the second half, it neuters Ms. Lambert’s gifts. Even with a voice as signature as hers, there’s little to elevate songs like “Good Ol’ Days” or “Dear Old Sun.”
    • 81 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    AM
    The songs are still sullen, smart and cleverly constructed. But too often on AM, Arctic Monkeys sound less like amalgamators than like imitators.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Colored Sands
    The album has stability, consistency. But too much of it.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    'Allelujah! Don't Bend! Ascend!
    The album wears thin in totality, but has isolated moments: entrances and releases and dropouts.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    I Don't Like Shit: I Don't Go Outside
    At 10 songs that span barely 30 minutes, this album is so terse it makes Nas’s “Illmatic” seem like “Infinite Jest.” And often it can feel as if Earl Sweatshirt is rapping his dense syllabic tumbles with his back facing the microphone, which is perplexing, since few rappers love the sound of sticky syllables as much as he does.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Manipulator
    There are 17 songs here, and after a while, they feel short on basic songwriting surprises: Built on narrow foundations, high on crude intuition, they keep running into walls.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Goldenheart
    The results have been slow and messy and atmospheric, full of contemporary R&B's customary ingredients (virtual strings, AutoTune, gold-plated emotion) but stretched out, heavy on atmosphere, light on hooks.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    I Am What I Am
    Mr. Haggard sounds more fatigued than his old sidekick, his voice less willing to bend. There are some lovely moments of stern self-loathing ("Bad Actor," "How Did You Find Me Here"); Mr. Haggard is always sharper when pointing the finger at himself than when celebrating love, as he often does on this album.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    The Black Swan
    Here and there this record finds its comfortable center. [16 Oct 2006]
    • The New York Times
    • 80 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    The Center Won't Hold
    Too many of the new songs sound diligent and derivative, as if Sleater-Kinney were working through a pop apprenticeship. It’s good to know that the group doesn’t want to repeat itself, that the band is also out to master 21st-century digital tools. But on “The Center Won’t Hold,” Sleater-Kinney hasn’t found its version 2.0.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Confessions On A Dance Floor
    But she's not attempting a simple 80's revival; for all the vaguely familiar hooks, there are also sustained, wistful overlays of strings and acoustic guitar that enfold the music like a haze of indistinct memory. [14 Nov 2005]
    • The New York Times
    • 80 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Antics
    In the end, unfortunately, "Antics" is fairly uneven. [19 Sep 2004]
    • The New York Times
    • 79 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Chromatica
    It has some sparkling vocal moments. It reminds us how easily Lady Gaga, 34, can coax the world onto the dance floor. But it feels overwhelmingly safe. ... “Chromatica” is also a mixed bag.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Cripple Crow
    Taking the onus off his guitar playing dilutes Mr. Banhart's talent, and sometimes "Cripple Crow" makes of him what some people perhaps want him to be: a simulacrum of an obscure 1960's musician, a maker of albums that were so rare they never existed. [12 Sep 2005]
    • The New York Times
    • 79 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Show Your Bones
    "Show Your Bones" doesn't confide much, but it's a picture of a band that's not quite sure what to do next. [27 Mar 2006]
    • The New York Times
    • 78 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Wrecking Ball
    It's got plenty of ups and downs.
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