Throughout it, the guitar tone recalls the sound of Oasis member Noel Gallagher; the music overall includes Punjabi instrumentation such as sitar and tabla.

The individual songs on the album vary in genre from the soul-funk of opener and closer "Heavy Soup" and the Daft Punk-aping disco house of "Music Plus 1" to the psychedelic number "Spectral Mornings" and the dance sound of "Slip the Drummer One".

To promote the single, Cornershop performed at the Reading and Leeds Festivals but by October 2002, their record label had released the band from their contract.

During the band's hiatus, frontman Tjinder Singh and guitarist Ben Ayres worked as DJs for some venues and radio stations.

[13] Alan Gregson and Philip Bagenal served as executive engineers; and Mike Marsh mastered the album at The Exchange.

[12] Matt Cibula of PopMatters referred to it as a concept album that was "made to express Singh's disapproval of the way modern music is handled".

[11] "Staging the Plaguing of the Raised Platform", which features a children's choir,[20] and strings and bass played by West Orange Studios owner Alan Gregson,[11] comes across as a remake of "Brimful of Asha".

[21] "Music Plus 1" copies the disco house sound of Daft Punk,[20] and blends dance beats, techno, electro-funk and jangly guitar work.

The lyrics include comments on the nu metal trend and the state of the music industry, which Singh said was "saddening to see what has happened to it – for it to be more manufactured, to see more managers running it, to see less artistry".

[24] "Motion the 11" is a roots reggae song,[20] with elements of Punjabi music[19] that is accompanied by Greenwood on flugelhorn, Gregson on bass and Doreen Edwards on vocals.

[14] "The London Radar" is an audio collage of clipped speech,[25] which recites aeroplane protocols,[15] recalling Daft Punk's sound[18] and the work of the Chemical Brothers.

[44] In July, the band were announced to support Oasis for one show in London,[45] and were expected to co-headline the festival Summer Sundae.

[53] In a review for The Guardian, Alexis Petridis complimented the variety of musical styles, writing; "[w]hat should be an incoherent jumble is held together by sheer exuberance".

(1980) by the Clash, the album's "ambitions are occasionally overreaching", saying "Spectral Mornings" is "pushing it a bit" and "Slip the Drummer One" "meanders about in a directionless, potheaded haze".

[20] Nichols said while "these lush tracks may at any instant recall Booker T., the Velvet Underground, XTC, T. Rex or countless other acts, they're indisputably Cornershop".

[17] Tim Kessler of NME said the album "lifts the soul with a joyful infusion of psychedelic thinking and brilliant rhythmic cross-genre filching".

[19] David Fricke of Rolling Stone called the album "a festive crash of cultures, a Babel of loops and ethnic body language.

"[23] Robert Christgau in The Village Voice praised Singh as someone who "comes to the idea of world music naturally" and described the album's mood as "[h]ow to be conscious and happy at the same time".

[14] Ian McCaleb and Brad Reno of Trouser Press said the album is a "very bad" sequel to Clinton's debut because it "focuses almost entirely on energetic grooves, proving that all the momentum in the world is worthless if it's not headed in a specific direction".

[21] Chart Attack writer Elizabeth Chorney-Booth criticized Cornershop for leaving "us waiting for nearly five years for something this mediocre" that had "too much filler".