[1] Pitchfork Media opined that it "belongs in a pretty select group of great, instrumental avant-rock albums".

[6] A BBC review describe Massacre as "an unholy union of The Shadows, Captain Beefheart, Derek Bailey and Funkadelic", and called Killing Time "genius".

[2] Howard Mandel wrote in a review in DownBeat that on Killing Time Massacre show that they are as "aggressive" as their name, and "more purposeful" than their debut album's title.

[3] Mandel concluded that Maher is "solid", Laswell "flexible and alert", and Frith "possessed by electric possibilities", and added that "[t]hey're convinced of what they're up to, and that certainty leaps from the grooves.

[7] FACT ranked it the 26th best album of the 1980s, calling it "a furiously addictive brand of semi-improvised, nitro-enhanced instrumental rock – a path Ruins and Battles would duly troop down decades later.