Resident Advisor's Scores

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For 1,177 reviews, this publication has graded:
  • 53% higher than the average critic
  • 6% same as the average critic
  • 41% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 1.9 points higher than other critics. (0-100 point scale)
Average Music review score: 75
Highest review score: 100 Biokinetics [Reissue]
Lowest review score: 36 Déjà-Vu
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 1,018 out of 1177
  2. Mixed: 158 out of 1177
  3. Negative: 1 out of 1177
1177 music reviews
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    • 77 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    kiCK iiiii
    These songs are whittled down, a rare moment where the overwhelming density of Arca's music falls away, raw and stripped of any protective coating. ... There's a newfound and striking intimacy—the last gasps of the KiCK series before the explosive climax "Crown," where kiCK iiiii's softness is ripped apart by cathartic blasts of noise. It's one final, triumphant punch that leaves everything on the table.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    kick iiii
    Left bruised and raw from the previous entry, the soft pads and thick walls of synth noise on tracks like the Planningtorock-featuring "Queer" feel like weighted blankets. ... kick iiii plays like a surrealist diary of Ghersi's experiences as a queer person and transgender woman.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    KicK iii
    Anyone who's seen her DJ could tell you about the confrontational aggression she hasn't yet captured on an official album. KicK iii tries, pushing the choppy, freeform and unrelenting part of Arca to the fore and pulverizing the listener over its brief, 36-minute runtime.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Kick ii
    Here she pushes things in a more aggressive direction: on "Tiro," her vocals become increasingly scattered and dramatic, as the percussion warps into a mash of cracking whips, laser shots and grinding metal. On its back half, KICK ii dips into abstract territory, sounding more like a tangled web of overactive synapses than anything immediately recognizable as pop.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Source: We Move
    By drawing energy from Garcia’s abundant source, these remixers try to answer those questions in their own respective sonic languages, offering intriguing answers and new ways to hear Garcia's potent energy.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Space 1.8
    Sinephro's spaces not only feel full of life, they're built with the very sounds of it, too, reminding us not to take it for granted.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Water
    When relationship blindspots are exposed in "Always You," the untroubled lust of earlier tracks matures into some of the album's most introspective moments.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Shade
    Shade is another beautiful and often devastating entry in the Grouper catalog.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Honest Labour
    Like Reed, Tarelle and Inyang are involved in gritty, street-level investigative poetics. ... This is detective work, through which they hope to discover their own place—figuratively and literally—a sense of purpose, of honest labour.
    • 80 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Eternal Home
    Eternal Home is by no means an easy listen, especially for people who aren't used to extreme metal vocals. But it's well worth the effort—the LP features some of the most beautiful music I've heard all year.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Mod Prog Sic
    Mod Prog Sic is the latest stop on this journey, taking the band to an evolved new place for a deeply satisfying blend of primal expression and visceral pleasure.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Liminal Soul
    Liminal Soul doesn't have the pop-fueled rush of her last LP, nor the lo-fi chill of her debut album, Ariadna. It displays her vast set of influences, brilliant vocals and ultimately, the infinite potential of Russia's dance music scene.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Established!
    Its best moments draw you to the formative dance floors of Space's past, the parties where he watched dancers react to the thrilling amalgam of styles that would become footwork, and where he danced himself, absorbing the lessons that would feed into a genre based on movement.
    • 81 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Colourgrade
    Where Devotion was light and feathery, Colourgrade is haunting and visceral. She sounds wiser, more assured, laser-focused on what matters most.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Black Encyclopedia of the Air
    The 13-track record is anti-corporate music at its finest—this was not created for mere enjoyment, but as an outlet for the global psychic mood. Each track feels like 2020. ... The entire album is captivating, but the middle section is exceptional. ... In Ayewa's hands the heady concept [Afrofuturism] gets new life.
    • 82 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Antiphonals
    Free from spatial or historical associations, these songs now feel modern and ancient at once. The album's undulating textures can distort familiar surroundings and plunge the listener into heady contemplation. It's a defining work for Davachi that once again demonstrates her uncanny ability to draw new and arresting shapes and feelings from familiar materials.
    • 75 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Before I Die
    Hye Jin refines her sound, pulling from trap and boom-bap, not to mention dubstep and techno, to turn out a coming of age hip-house album. Before I Die is the clearest artistic vision we've heard from Hye Jin.
    • 88 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Sometimes I Might Be Introvert
    While GREY Area was a collection of great songs, Sometimes I Might Be Introvert feels like a therapeutic breakthrough. ... A body of work so rich with innovation, so broad in its influences and so powerful in its storytelling that we'll still be finding new things to love until the next one comes along.
    • 85 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Fire
    Fire is a classic-style Bug album, just with everything turned up to 11. It's more intense, but the rhythms are familiar and the format is the same.
    • 77 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Mirrors
    On his latest, the palpable, sometimes uneven spontaneity that defined the first few years of DJ Seinfeld is gone. In its place is the sound of a producer who's found a confident, definitive voice.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Dissent
    This is an experimental record culled from fully improvised sessions, so it follows that some zones feel more inspired than others. To these ears, some of the most inspired of Dissent's "Chapters" are more densely referential than previous MVOT music.
    • 84 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    No Sun
    She's continuing the very tradition she's studying, ending her intimate and vulnerable album with a cover that finds new purpose by making someone else's words—and grief—all her own.
    • 83 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Moot!
    Moot! is an unpretentious and fun record peppered with quick gear changes, pitch shifts and soul-searching anecdotes about empty neighbourhoods and peering into dark waters at dusk. Everything is immediate and anchored by Magaletti's percussion, which is both raw and immaculate.
    • 78 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Still Slipping, Vol. 1 [Mixtape]
    still slipping vol. 1 is an honest and humanizing document, giving us a deeper look into the musical styles and influence that drive Joy Orbison than anything else we've heard before.
    • 64 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Preacher's Sigh & Potion: Lost Album
    The record holds up alongside standout moments from Dear's discography, but adopts an unexpectedly rugged disposition.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 70 Critic Score
    Spiral
    The LP's spirally nature is actually its biggest problem, as the duo choose to coil back into themselves again and again, creating a merely good album that’s on the cusp of greatness.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Reflection
    Reflection bangs, sounds enormous cranked up loud, but it's also dreamlike and soothing. There is plenty of pain and uncertainty in these tracks. But altogether, the album is a salve for the listener, and maybe for James herself.
    • 79 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Broken Hearts and Beauty Sleep
    None of these ventures feel forced, instead they flourish under the weight of some heavy emotional themes. After this versatile and unexpectedly wholesome depiction of a broken heart, Mykki Blanco has earned some deserved beauty sleep.
    • 86 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Fatigue
    Cheek's vocals are versatile, often soaring into her upper register, then trickling into lower notes. Much of the lyrics across the album are a challenge to make out, but it's a delight to pull scattered meaning out of the obscurity.
    • 76 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Man Made
    A testament to her versatility and willingness to experiment, Man Made entrenches Greentea Peng's position as one of the UK's most exciting young songwriters.
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