Stylus Magazine's Scores

  • Music
Select another publication »
For 1,453 reviews, this publication has graded:
  • 50% higher than the average critic
  • 3% same as the average critic
  • 47% lower than the average critic
On average, this publication grades 4.1 points lower than other critics. (0-100 point scale)
Average Music review score: 69
Highest review score: 100 Fed
Lowest review score: 0 Encore
Score distribution:
  1. Positive: 987 out of 1453
  2. Mixed: 361 out of 1453
  3. Negative: 105 out of 1453
1453 music reviews
view
per page
    • 74 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Aha Shake Heartbreak
    Apart from Caleb Followill’s distinctive, growly vocals--half-man half-grizzly--this could be a completely different band. A much better band. It’s quite an incredible transformation--and I’ll say this upfront: it doesn’t matter what you thought of their debut, you should listen to this album.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 67 Critic Score
    Dancing With Daggers
    In small doses it’ll absolutely cure what ails you. Unfortunately, taken in one album-sized chunk, the effect tends to wear thin—a doubly damning criticism since Dancing With Daggers is only ten seconds shy of being thirty minutes long.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Mr. Beast
    There’s little to differentiate Mr. Beast from Happy Songs, and less to recommend it in the face of Mogwai’s potent catalog.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 75 Critic Score
    Here Come The Tears
    It’s obvious that Brett Anderson and Bernard Butler have not lost a bit of the touch that made them famous in the early 1990s.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Alphabetical
    Its airily liquid, peculiarly French dance-pop is crafted to be almost entirely unmemorable at first, but upon familiarity grow into a wonderfully subtle, hook-laden album of continent-hopping (sub)urban pop which makes an ideological virtue of its superficiality.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    The Beatific Visions
    The downside of the Brakes development is the loss of the raw power that accompanied some of their more demented moments.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    The Runaway Found
    They’re a perfect opening band: professional and sufficiently appealing on a sonic level without risking upstaging the headliner with any distinct personality or emotional resonance.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    On My Way To Absence
    On On My Way To Absence Jurado provides far more satisfying moments than dubious ones, and that’s no small feat when trafficking in the kind of bottom of the barrel human emotion that Jurado has made his trademark.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    We Have Sound
    He’s a post-techno indie geek making clattering, dead-end grooves with clumsy-but-endearing melodies splattered over the top like oil stains pressed in symmetrical folds of paper to make a Rorschach pattern that just happens to be a song.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 83 Critic Score
    Love Is Simple
    Love Is Simple is Akron’s most streamlined album, one that bridges their multitudes and, finally, puts forth a series of discreet songwriting ideas rather than merely splashing about in genres.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 78 Critic Score
    Bazooka Tooth
    Perhaps the producers have toned themselves down a bit just so Aesop can rock harder. Maybe they don’t want to steal his thunder. Whatever their motivation, the beats feel somewhat restrained, lethargic and lazy. But they are perfectly suited to Aesop’s limpid down-tempo rhymes.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 56 Critic Score
    Again
    Again is an opportunity missed by such distance as to become pointless and even irritating.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 90 Critic Score
    Kesto (234.48:4)
    Kesto is an overwhelming, unbelievable adventure, but it's not for everyone.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 62 Critic Score
    The Soul Sessions
    It’s a good voice, but it’s not a good album.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 69 Critic Score
    The New Romance
    Pretty Girls Make Graves fall slightly short of their ambitions and capabilities, producing songs that are good, even very good, but less than what they’ve proved themselves to be capable of.
    • 74 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    Because Of You
    Because of You mostly reminds us of the Ne-Yo Problem. He wants to be bad, but chickens out at the last minute.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 91 Critic Score
    Plat du Jour
    For a high-minded piece of process, one that rests on the old trope that the good stuff is always bad for you--or in this case, for the majority of the world--Herbert packs a lot of snap, crackle, and, particularly, pop.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Road To Rouen
    The last decade has bled the band dry of energy and verve meaning that where once these songs would have been pop classics, now they’re tastefully tuneful AOR.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 80 Critic Score
    Peace Love Death Metal
    Canned Heat mixed with Kiss and chopped into lines with Elvis and Queens Of The Stone Age.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 83 Critic Score
    The B.Coming
    One of the strongest albums of 2005, Beanie Sigel stands among the greatest of the Roc-A-Fella catalogue with technical ability and an emotional severity worth experiencing.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 50 Critic Score
    Nightlife
    The problem with Nightlife is that, with the exception of “Hotel Suicide,” nothing really stands out.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 83 Critic Score
    Doctor's Advocate
    For the most part Game sounds desperate, raw, and ravenously hungry.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 58 Critic Score
    1968
    A bit too predictable and lightweight.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 83 Critic Score
    Darkness At Noon
    What is remarkable is the way that they have made a recording that can remain entertaining and engaging, resist becoming background, even while leaving you with the nagging sense that it was about nothing but the act of musical reference itself.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 85 Critic Score
    Final Straw
    The fact that the music, vocals and melodies are stunning is just icing on the cake - a cake that is crumbling before your eyes.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 81 Critic Score
    The Neptunes Present... Clones
    What happens in The Neptunes Present... Clones is that Pharrell, Chad and co. say “look what we can do”, and then proceed to show us that they can do nearly everything.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 60 Critic Score
    The Young Machines
    Frequently, he’s sharp and funny - full of self-knowledge and charm. Elsewhere, he’s so devastatingly sincere that it’s almost embarrassing to listen to.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 75 Critic Score
    Meek Warrior
    Close listening is rewarding--the boys have a knack for crafting intricate songs that lean heavily on texture and subtle interplay--but perhaps a bit too gentle.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 67 Critic Score
    Crazy Itch Radio
    The transition from tracks to songs forces the group to rein in a style that needs to be no-holds-barred. When Basement Jaxx uses this restraint to their advantage... it’s easy to buy the direction they taken. When it doesn’t, Crazy Itch Radio just makes the group appear dense.
    • 73 Metascore
    • 75 Critic Score
    Good Bad Not Evil
    Parts of Good Bad Not Evil have some fascinating sonic touches.
Page: