[3] New York Times critic Jon Pareles wrote that the band "makes great, raucous, tuneful rock albums, but no one can figure out how to sell them."

[4] The Curse of the Mekons was recorded during a period when the band was dispirited and unhappy about their comparative lack of success while alternative rock as a genre was reaching its highest popular acclaim.

[1] After the recording of The Curse of the Mekons, drummer Steve Goulding and bassist Lu Edmonds both quit the band; they were replaced by, respectively, John Langley of the Blue Aeroplanes and Sarah Corina.

"[1] The New York Times' Pareles called it "a brilliant album that wraps tuneful rockers around topics like German reunification, the drug business and the collapse of Communism in Eastern Europe", and wrote that the band had moved past their earlier, deliberate amateurism, saying that their songs of this era were "loose and rangy" and "have a muscular beat and catchy guitar riffs, yet they never sound too polished.

"[4] Mike Boehm of the Los Angeles Times wrote that in comparison to the hard-driving sound of their previous album, Curse "eases back on the throttle a bit, giving more emphasis to the country-music roots that have marked the band’s work since the mid-'80s," but also noted that the lyrics were just as biting as earlier: "The songs are full of images of a culture out of whack, numbed by drugs and the desire for consumer commodities, subject to authoritarian control and ravaged by violence.