Every week, critics publish dozens of album reviews, each on its own scale. Pitchfork scores out of 10 and Rolling Stone hands out stars. B-Side Breakdowns puts those reviews side by side, so you can see where the critics landed on an album and where they split.
Right now that’s 80,658 critic reviews behind 12,465 Breakdowns, on albums released as far back as 1940.
How it works
We check 55 outlets for every new album: AllHipHop, Americana UK, Angry Metal Guy, The Arts Desk, Beats Per Minute, Blabbermouth, Clash, Consequence, Cult Following, Dead Rhetoric, Distorted Sound, DIY, Dork, Exclaim!, The Guardian, Hot Press, The Independent, Irish Examiner, The Irish Times, Kerrang!, The Line of Best Fit, Louder, Louder Than War, Metal Planet Music, Metal Temple, Mojo, musicOMH, The Needle Drop, NME, No Ripcord, Noizze, Northern Transmissions, Paste, Pitchfork, PopMatters, RapReviews, Record Collector, Riff Magazine, Rolling Stone, Rolling Stone Australia, Rolling Stone UK, RTÉ, Saving Country Music, Slant, Sonic Perspectives, Soul in Stereo, Spectrum Culture, Spill Magazine, Spin, Toilet ov Hell, Uncut, Under the Radar, Upset, Wall of Sound and XS Noize. When one of them reviews an album with a score, we put that score on a 0 to 100 scale and add it to the album’s page. Four stars out of five becomes 80, an 8.4 out of 10 becomes 84 and a B+ becomes 75.
Once three critics have weighed in, the album gets its B-Side Breakdown: a plain average of every score. Each outlet counts once per album, and every outlet counts the same. New releases are marked Early reviews until eight critics have weighed in, since the first few scores can move the number a lot.
Every Breakdown gets a verdict. Heavy Rotation is 85 and up, Keeper is 70 to 84, Mixed Bag is 55 to 69, and anything lower goes to the Back of the Crate. An album at 70 or higher is one the critics liked, and it shows in green.
How the verdicts fall
Share of albums here at each verdict.
The archive
Most review aggregators only cover the last couple of decades. We go back further. Another 26 outlets reach us through the Professional ratings boxes on Wikipedia’s album pages, including print magazines like Q, Blender and Melody Maker, record guides and newspapers. Those scores are marked via Wikipedia, and each one links to the original review when we can find it online.
Two rules keep the archive honest. An outlet that launched after an album came out doesn’t count for that album’s anniversary reissue, unless the album’s Wikipedia ratings box lists it. And when an outlet reviewed the same album twice, years apart, both scores count, each labeled with its year.
Past the average
An average can hide a fight. Every Breakdown comes with Approval, the share of critics who scored the album 70 or higher, and Divisiveness, which shows how close the scores sit to each other on a scale running Unanimous, Broad agreement, Some debate, Divided and Contentious. A modest Breakdown can come from critics who all agree, and a strong one can come from a room split in half. The album page shows you which.
How often critics agree
Albums with five or more reviews, by how close their scores sit.
Listeners get a say too. Every album page asks one question, “Would you spin it again?” Your answers become the Replay rate.
A-Sides
The critics’ top tier. An album is an A-Side when its Breakdown is 90 or higher, from at least 5 reviews, with 75% approval or more. 283 albums qualify right now. The badge comes off on its own if later reviews pull an album below the line.
Critics and outlets
Each review shows the critic who wrote it when we can find a byline, on the outlet’s own page or in the citation on Wikipedia. 5,987 critics have their own pages, with every review of theirs we track. Every outlet has a page too, with its critics, its reviews and how it scores.
The B-Side take
When we’ve reviewed an album ourselves, our take sits at the top of its page in our own words, with a link to the full review. It never counts toward the Breakdown.
How we’re different
Metacritic weights some critics more than others and doesn’t publish how. Our Breakdown is a straight average, and every album page shows its math. Letter grades count as the star rating they match, so a B+ sits with a 7.5 out of 10.
Report a problem
We read scores automatically from each outlet’s page, and now and then a page layout trips us up. Every album page has a Report a problem link at the bottom. Send us a note and we’ll fix the score.