Exclaim's Scores

  • Music
Select another publication »
For 5,096 reviews, this publication has graded:
  • 57% higher than the average critic
  • 5% same as the average critic
  • 38% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 2 points higher than other critics. (0-100 point scale)
Average Music review score: 75
Highest review score: 100 Vol.II
Lowest review score: 10 California Son
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 4,315 out of 5096
  2. Mixed: 753 out of 5096
  3. Negative: 28 out of 5096
5096 music reviews
view
per page
    • 66 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Always Tomorrow
    They've elevated their music from songs you listened to at your job in a coffee shop or in your parents basement, to music you want to play in the car or in your grown up apartment. You can find a sense of nostalgia without losing some of the comfort that age has brought you.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Aloha
    Aloha is a pleasant-enough sounding slice of raspy-sounding soul with enough genuine emotion to spare.
    • 75 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Meet the Woo, Vol. 2 [Mixtape]
    Though the tone of Pop Smoke's voice is already enough to set him apart from other artists coming out of New York, there's energy felt in his music that keeps you engaged. We'll have Meet the Woo 2 to remember that energy forever.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Surrender Your Poppy Field
    Surrender Your Poppy Field is another solid entry in the Guided By Voices canon, and one that fans or curious onlookers that want a newer entry point into the group shouldn't miss.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Man Alive!
    If previous King Krule efforts could be accused of sad-boy narcissism, Man Alive! shows that Marshall's gaze has never been entirely directed at his own navel. Despair is still there in his songwriting, but so is the capacity for change.
    • 70 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Names of North End Women
    Melding pensive acoustic picking with sweeping synths and barely there rhythms, Raül Refree helps Lee Ranaldo sound daring, fearless and downright experimental again on Names of North End Women.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Random Desire
    Dulli has spent his whole career as a shape-shifting storyteller and Random Desire sees this continue. While most of his remaining '90s contemporaries have become self-parodies, Dulli continually finds ways to explore the hidden pain of the human experience.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Miss Anthropocene
    The real surprise of Miss Anthropocene is that it actually sounds like a fairly standard Grimes album. She's a become a controversial public figure whose whole persona is like one big multimedia art project, so this is a welcome return to her wheelhouse.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Splid
    Kvelertak aren't creating any surprises on Splid, they are simply doing it better than they ever have before, showing they are greater than all the individual parts of their sound.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    UNLOCKED
    The Denzel Curry x Kenny Beats team up is a master-class of hip hop — few artists in today's landscape have the talent and longevity to consistently deliver good music. Thankfully, Denzel Curry is one of those few.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Chicka Boom!
    No wonder the Man In Black himself recruited Neilson and her fellow musician relatives to be his opening act back in the day — she proved then, as she does on CHICKABOOM!, to be a worthy successor to the Sun Record sound.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Loom
    With this album, Gately set out to "capture the weird spikey nature of this kind of looming doom, but also to include some absurd colours," and the result is a swirling mix of eerie atmosphere, devastating emotion and brilliant sonic abstraction. It is Gately's best work yet.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Brave Faces Everyone
    The band have put a lot of work into refining their sound and making it bigger, fuller and bolder. There's more harmony, texture and structure in every song, and the choruses are huge and uplifting.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Boniface
    Boniface is youth music, both in its vibrant shimmer and its wide-eyed, confessional storytelling, verging on embarrassing but typically landing somewhere raw and urgent.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Dark Matter
    As the artist has noted himself, Boyd has finally stepped out of his label as a jazz musician to embrace himself as a producer who also plays jazz.
    • 71 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Laughing Gas [EP]
    While recent work has affirmed that Tatum's comfort zone is clear, Laughing Gas is a reminder that he is still open to exploration.
    • 68 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    And It's Still Alright
    It's a late night listening record set in the candlelit environment of the human psyche and a worthy followup to Nathaniel's Falling Faster Than You Can Run.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    2017 - 2019
    2017-2019 is the music we need in 2020: ambitious, fearless and provocative.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    The Slow Rush
    It's upbeat, fashionable and sounds great in the background when you're only half paying attention. Rather than seizing his moment in the spotlight, Parker sounds like he's just enjoying the journey.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Modus Vivendi
    Ultimately, Shake carves out poetic tranquility in the entropy of her messy relationship, showing her audience the art of Modus Vivendi — or the peaceful coexistence of conflicting forces.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Texas Sun [EP]
    Texas Sun is a cool side project that is able to exist on its own without the pressures that critical acclaim has brought to both artists.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Quadra
    You can't exactly say Sepultura are back. They never went anywhere in the first place. But they've (rather amazingly) broken new ground on Quadra. Make sure to check it out.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    All or Nothing
    On All or Nothing, Shopping talk big and play loud, showing their sharp sense of what makes people move. It's an album that just can't wait to be released, to spread its way through a gathered crowd — and, at last, to watch the motion begin.
    • 68 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Father of All…
    The most notable thing about the record is how excited everyone sounds. It crackles with energy, buoyed by the feeling that the trio are finally unshackled by their past. It's punchy, and the hooks generally last long past the record's short runtime.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Never Not Together
    A welcome late-career gem.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Scis
    Scis demonstrates that, 27 years into his recording career, Markus Popp is still managing to come off forward-thinking and forward-sounding.
    • 71 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Black Sarabande
    His latest is an unhurried flow of ambient piano pieces that, despite the implications of the title, are only momentarily dark and far from risqué, perhaps at times more suited for those soft intimate moments made for two, or most certainly personal reflections made for one.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    U Kin B The Sun
    Across U kin B the Sun, Ford's first record in six years, she offers affirmations that are deeply touching and inspiring.
    • 89 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    We're New Again: A Reimagining by Makaya McCraven
    What makes We're New Again so fascinating lies in the fact that Makaya McCraven benevolently and sonically recognizes Gil Scott-Heron's grief, joy, and legacy, making sure these vital expressions remain the album's true focus.
    • 75 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Hurry Up and Wait
    Dune Rats might be known for trivial punk rock songs about millennial angst and partying, but their new album proves the band can be much more.
Page: