The internet is awash with reviews and opinions on music releases. I did not want to be just another voice. Rather I thought 'why not pull together the ratings of those people who are paid to be critics - the music journalists?'
CD Review King is a website that brings you the ratings of 10 UK-based music journals and newspapers. By summarising the ratings given by the critics you can perhaps receive a more balanced view of how an album has been received before you buy it.
Keeping this site up-to-date and seeing the albums that are given high scores each month has encouraged me to check out new and interesting music. I hope it will encourage you to do likewise. There is some amazing music out there that does not become part of the mainstream but is critically warmly reviewed.
I do not reprint the text of the review and would always advocate reading the reviews themselves to understand the genre of the music and to pick up the substance behind the rating. In other words this site is NOT a substitute for subscribing to the magazine or reading the newspaper of your choice!
Reviewing will always have a degree of subjectivity within it and a rating is likely to reflect the musical taste of both the reviewer and the publication.
By averaging scores across a number of reviews a truer reflection of the quality of that CD should emerge. The cream does seem to rise to the top and you will see both from the review ratings and the end of year listings, that the great albums are universally appreciated.
I also hope that in understanding how music is rated by each of the magazines, those of you in the UK will be able to find one that matches your taste and to which you will wish to subscribe.
Andrew Helm, 2008
The information is organised by band/artist with album releases by each artist.
Summarises album releases by month of release. The page defaults to the current month. Albums are sorted by average score (highest at the top).
Displays links to end-of-year lists from the music journals and also music prize nominees and winners.