No Ripcord's Scores

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For 2,825 reviews, this publication has graded:
  • 43% higher than the average critic
  • 3% same as the average critic
  • 54% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 2.8 points lower than other critics. (0-100 point scale)
Average Music review score: 70
Highest review score: 100 Strawberry Jam
Lowest review score: 0 Scream
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 1,983 out of 2825
  2. Mixed: 765 out of 2825
  3. Negative: 77 out of 2825
2825 music reviews
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    • 65 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Specter at the Feast
    With the exception of the more melodious tracks coming in pairs and slightly hindering the flow of an otherwise excellent album, Specter at the Feast is a very good effort from BRMC, and an example of the continued revitalization that started sometime around Leah Shapiro’s arrival to the band in 2008.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Wait For Me
    Wait For Me hugs the middle of the road with such caution, it’s strenuous to either love or hate.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    S-M 2: Abyss in B Minor
    Abyss isn't a failure--their audacity to upend themselves, contriving each and every step of the way with an expansive sound that masks away the more attention-grabbing arrangements is worthy. Props to them for sounding like everyone else and no one else at the same time.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Yeah Right
    They are only a few steps away from making a truly great record, because they certainly aren't lacking in talent, they just need an identity to give it a purpose.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Sleep Forever
    The only problem (and I don't even know if its a problem) is that every track registers as an epic of some sort, so much so that the album itself registers as a pleasurable, cathartic blur rather than a cohesive statement itself.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 30 Critic Score
    Rush!
    A miserable buffet of rock ‘n’ roll cliches, from saccharine ballads to off-color glam to bland MTV rock. It’s essentially homeopathic rock muzak.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Talk About Body
    When an album's main faults are that its too upbeat and lyrically too ambitious, it really is one that deserves to be talked about.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Mylo Xyloto
    Mylo Xyloto does have its unpredictable moments, some of which work more effectively than others.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Kiss & Tell
    Although Kiss and Tell doesn’t quite match the dizzy heights of its major influences, it is without a doubt Sahara Hotnights’ finest album to date.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Two-Way Mirror
    Parts of Two-Way Mirror give me hope for the future, but their seeming inability to hammer out a concrete songwriting method makes me doubt they'll figure it out anytime soon.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Pagans in Vegas
    There's a patchwork of pleasantness woven throughout.... By the time the closing tracks roll around, the album has fallen apart entirely. These instrumentals are complete afterthoughts and belong nowhere.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Free Dimensional
    These songs feel more accessible and much less significant. There are a few tracks here that reanimate that sense of excitement which permeated his previous record but they are few and far between.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Shine
    There is a lack of uniqueness in the overall concepts and sonics of the project.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 30 Critic Score
    Law Of The Playground
    Now, there’s nothing wrong with something throwaway now and again, but it’s difficult to stomach over the course of eleven tracks.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 30 Critic Score
    Outrage! Is Now
    Outrage! Is Now is unequivocally uninspired, shelving almost all of the rawness that put the Toronto doublet on the map thirteen years ago. It’s lyrically apathetic, and Jesse F. Keeler’s basslines have lost all of their punishing nature.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Banks
    At times, the songs feel a tad underdeveloped, with sumptuous hooks shining bright over slipshod, kraut-inspired synths and metallic percussion lines... [Yet] Banks can still write a killer song like Summertime is Coming, which greatly overshadows most of the others.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    I Love You Go Easy
    I Love You, Go Easy is an uneven album, not just going from song to song, but within the songs themselves. It offers a variety of moments, some brilliant and entrancing, but not without a few distracting decisions.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Get Lost
    Get Lost may not be the incredible experience that Living was, but it's still a very enjoyable listen.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Sex Change
    Their jokes and concepts and imitations have sunk into their bones and become tools for them to make some of the best music of the year thus far.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Mama, I'm Swollen
    For a band like Cursive to produce an album as self-pitying and mournful as Swollen is, frankly, a disappointment, especially considering the fact that the Omaha quartet tackled twenty-something melodrama with such delightful insolence on "Ugly Organ."
    • 65 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Welcome Joy
    It closes with the sigh of "Bramble," another one of the band’s well-crafted whispers that seems more like a lo-fi sketch than a fully realized song. In isolated moments like this Welcome Joy shines as a companion piece equal to their first release, "Invitation Songs."
    • 65 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Time [EP]
    Ultimately, Time’s liquidity, while mesmerising to some, will be a distance myth to others.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Different Gear, Still Speeding
    Different Gear, Still Speeding could be a good album if they just scaled things down a bit.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 30 Critic Score
    Crush Songs
    Given that these songs mostly clock in under two minutes, that should be enough to carry the flat arrangements and melodies, but it's not.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    The Blueprint 3
    The real inexcusable thing about The Blueprint 3 is how boring and sterile it all sounds.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 40 Critic Score
    Gauntlet Hair
    There's much promise for an act like Gauntlet Hair to floor its contemporaries with time, but as it stands, their grimy, sewage system is in dire need of maintenance.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    %
    Dinowalrus is at the surface, speaking the language spoken years ago by the voices on those dusty LPs they hold near and dear but that’s part of the problem.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Candela
    Candela has some shining moments but, overall, is an album that teases the palette instead of really satisfying.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Kiss Land
    While this leap into the big leagues proves that he’s still very much a rare talent, it unfortunately seems that genuine inspiration is even rarer.
    • 65 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    Forever
    There seems to be an innate knack for melody on display here that produces several moments of pop joy.
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