Exclaim's Scores

  • Music
For 5,105 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:
5105 music reviews
    • 64 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    For what it's worth, we know Eminem is an incredible lyricist. We know he has punch lines that can pierce your mind and make you laugh. But what we don't know is whether or not he has anything real to say, and to his detriment, Music to Be Murdered By puts that in the spotlight.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Experiencing the music of OOIOO is an incredibly satisfying series of sensations that seems to form an exclusive bond between creator and listener. It's a plunge into unbridled creativity that is the true essence of psychedelia.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    While Of Montreal's brand of pop music has often been brainy and verbose, these songs offer simpler pleasures. UR FUN is, well, fun.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Here the songs unfold with greater purpose, the verses and choruses more defined. It is both physically rousing and emotionally moving.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    His gruff vocals hold pain and weariness as he reflects on his struggles and challenges. Yet, however difficult it might be to ingest his candour, there is also a maturity about Miller in which to take solace. There's a sense of growth and lessons learned. These are the marks of a life well-lived, however short.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Manic is her most personal album to date.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    It captures the sense of being not here, and not there, but somewhere pleasantly ambiguous — a Land of No Junction, indeed.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    A dose of psychedelic pop, captivating hooks, and guitar trembles enhance the listening experience. Exploring the themes of new opportunities, growth, disconnection and hope, listeners can feel frontman Jack Steadman's raw emotions.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    He has picked up the promising pieces from his last release, putting together a distinctive and more ambitious sound. Jenkins' hero, Scott-Heron, would certainly be proud.
    • 75 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Even though it doesn't reach the exhilarating highs of their peak moments, Deleter works as a serviceable showcase of the band's grasp of controlled rhythm and noise.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    All in all, while sometimes dragging and repetitive, there are enough moments of epic tension-resolving buildups and sonically interesting tracks that make this album worth checking out.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Where it stumbles as a concept record, it only sometimes succeeds as an art-rock record. As it turns out, an important idea does not an important album make.
    • 59 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    The Replacements were so luminescent because they played their bizarre, specific brand of rock for the kids at the front, all snot, spit and sweat. In trying so blatantly to recapture that magic, The Deadbeat Bang of Heartbreak City can't help but feel like a lot of smoke and mirrors.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Beyond the overt gimmickry of the singles "Concrete" and "BLOODMONEY" (the latter sounds like she went rooting through Skrillex's trash), I Disagree is often surprisingly unchaotic.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Each song stands out as its own unique piece of the puzzle, a quality that is easy to lose on electro-pop albums. The standout tracks will continue to impress while the rest will add to an increasingly impressive body of work.
    • 63 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    With so many loose threads, JACKBOYS isn't the compilation album one would hope for — instead, it seems rushed and put together to make a year-end release.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Regardless of your level of faith or denomination, the 19-track album is accessible enough from a craft and sanctified standpoint. Whether it's for interpolations of Kanye tracks like "Fade," with "Follow Me – Faith" — itself a gospelized riff off the classic house track by Aly-Us — or for a new take on "Ultralight Beam," off 2016's The Life of Pablo, there's a lot here to vibe off of.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    A solid album but also not a surprising one. To boot, the main thing that grounds this album with a sense of time and place is the political side of it.
    • 100 Metascore
    • 100 Critic Score
    Taken together, these 97 minutes of music provide a tantalizing glimpse of the direction the group could have taken had it not disbanded at the end of 1989. Absolutely essential.
    • 72 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Merriweather Post Pavilion remains as culturally important as it felt back in 2009. Ballet Slippers mines that very significance for its pure euphoria, and with carefully selected performances and interpretations, this celebration of that groundbreaking work does justice to its source material.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Utilizing a variety of different sound palettes, from glossy synths to pounding drums and chanting voices, Lopatin uses the Uncut Gems score to give the listener effective moments of tension, dreamlike airiness and triumph, all in equal measure, making the listening a journey all in itself.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    While 99% provided the initial space for Kaytranada to make his mark, BUBBA is where it matures.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    While various artists-type vehicles do tend to feel disjointed in spots — this one included— the versatility and energy of the Free Nationals is bolstered by their upper tier level of craft, something a lot of backing bands rarely receive credit for. With that in mind, this self-titled outing is a treat.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    With the band's integrity, commitment to their craft and immunity to the passing of time, they're sure to make their patient fans happy with Duster.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Fine Line is proof that Harry Styles has grown as an artist since his solo debut. He hasn't reached his full potential, but he's certainly well on his way.
    • 70 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    There isn't anything innovative about their music, but every note of this album feels honest and considered.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Wu has elevated this genre and he excels at the DJ-set LP format. His ability to place artists that inspired him coming up into a more modern context is powerful. It celebrates the work and at the same time moves the rest of us to dig deeper into the history of this incredible music.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    WHO
    It's the best album the Who have released since Who Are You in 1978.
    • 96 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Two-and-a-half-hour compilation Tunes 2011-2019 works its way backwards through the last decade of Burial's output, but like many of the producer's post-Untrue undertakings, it generally resists neat and tidy execution.
    • 71 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Romance still relies on a structure that is becoming increasingly irrelevant, which ultimately overshadows many of the album's redeemable moments.