In the magazine's review, James Oldham stated that it is "scorched, ragged and super heavy, "Highly Evolved" takes 'Bleach'-era Nirvana as its starting point and then proceeds to compress the whole of Kurt Cobain's career into a blistering minute and a half.

[1] Chris Dahlen of Pitchfork described the song as being "fine grunge, switching from bare strumming to throbbing, jagged, yet infectious guitar lines.

"[2] Allmusic's Heather Phares states ""Highly Evolved"'s primal beat and chunky guitars are certainly post-grunge, but not in the boringly earnest, imitative way that bands such as Silverchair were—the song's sludgy sexiness and tight structure also recall the '60s garage punk that shaped bands like Nirvana and Mudhoney.

"[5] PopMatters' Jon Garrett described it as "a pleasant blast of Nevermind-era Nirvana", with "frontman Craig Nicholls rumbling cadence often eerily mimics Cobain's.

In the last 30 seconds, the gauge goes into the red as the timer begins to buzz around the screen before the artist and song names appear at the end of the video.