He just keeps getting better at writhing around in this narrow space of homage and usually lands somewhere just between endearing and brilliant. [May 2013, p.67]

This is rain-choked pain music, inspirational negativity, hypnotic blood moon melodies over crack-slanging boasts. [Mar 2019, p.65]

The finished product proves too studied and reverent of its sources. [Jul 2014, p.64]

Porras here maps a liminal space with a fine balance of spontaneity and judgement, building towards a revelation which occurs--so as to preserve the mystery--just out of view. [May 2012, p.70]

When things do coalesce, and the absurd merges with the moving, Tonight You Look Like A Spider plays some mart, unpredictable tricks. [Aug 2013, p.60]

The album is notable for featuring White's first vocal performance, both on "I Don't Do/ Grand Central", where he's joined in spirited conversation by Zoh Amba, and the title track, on which he narrates his inner life through word association and repetition. It's a taste of a new compositional element that will be interesting to hear develop. The album's other collaborator is White's regular producer Guy Picciotto, whose light touch encourages an egalitarian approach to sound, where everything is in the mix and everything matters. [Jan/Feb 2026, p.94].

It's not completely pants, but not great either. [Jul 2011, p.44]

“In The South” is a mash-up with Gucci Mane and Pimp C that could’ve snuck on the back end of a posthumous UGK set. [Sep 2017, p.62]

An exciting second album. ... Their otherworldly fetishisation of dystopian collapse is so exhilarating it’s almost tolerable. [May 2020, p.48]

All the sharp, cold ridges of the usual electronic sound palette are sheared off and smoothed down on this beguilingly gentle release. [#228, p.65]

It's not that the album is bad per se. Like Venom, it delivers for an appreciative fanbase. It's just that they could do this shit in their sleep. [May 2026, p.58]

Nice enough, and the climax of the title track is truly transportive, but no real departure from previous form. [Mar 2015, p.56]

More than half of Pretty Ugly combines vocals prominently into the mix after a style that sometimes flounders in its own ambition. [Mar 2012, p.52]

Caught somewhere between the big yucks and the thoughtful overview are moments of genuine strangeness that are both captivating and unsettling. [#255, p.59]

Disappears present an album that sounds pretty confident in its pursuit of forward motion yet distractingly familiar. [Mar 2012, p.65]

Tutti is a journey to the centre of the soul, but it is a kindly one, and Cosey is a most excellent guide. [Mar 2019, p.61]

Some awful lyrical lapses scupper otherwise promising pieces. [#223, p.51]

Putting it plainly, this stuff sounds really old. The beats are dull, flat and 'blunted' in the least appealing sense. [Jan 2012, p.56]

The epic slog of Culture II offers up more than 20 courses of candyfloss, toffee apple and burnt syrup in lieu of any real variety. [Apr 2018, p.68]

An album whose sustained brilliance reveals both an artist liberated from the need to try too hard, and finally armed with more to express than sarcastic teenage angst. [Jun 2015, p.55]

DJ Shadow’s latest is a hulking, 26 track beast that shifts from uptempo breakbeat and rubbery electropop to string-laden suites with relative ease. ... With synthesized tones ranging from lush to jarring, the instrumentals indicate the ear for texture that has characterised Shadow’s work since 1996’s Entroducing. [Jan 2020, p.69]

Most of Raw Solutions is a working-through of moves from Chicago House from Juke to footwork to Ghetto House, and while well done, doesn't leave its own stamp as an outside interpretation. [May 2013, p.66]

There's not much variety over these nine tracks, but to hell with variety when you sound this good. [Dec 2008, p.56]

The mixes (on the second disc) reinforce the strength and weaknesses of Pyramids, not only showcasing their craftmanship in the surface of sound, but also insinuating that there might not be much beyond these sculped surfaces. [July 2008, p.55]

Ying & Yang, ultimately, just sounds a bit matey. [Nov 2012, p.61]

Half of the songs here are as good as the highs of the first two albums.... Much of the rest is the victim of Madlib's infuriating tendency to leave things in fragments. [Jun 2013, p.54]

The veneer slides aside to reveal more palpable excitement with the arrival of MCs from the UK grime contingent. [Mar 2015, p.48]

The emphasis now is on the delicate interplay between acousitc guitars, and vocals which sound somewhere between Jonathan Donahue and Syd Barrett. [#221, p.66]