Gary Giddins wrote in 2008 for The New Yorker that both albums "uncovered her Mississippi roots, hardly noted in her earlier work, and freed her to revisit more recent pop songs, from the Monkees to U2...She also emerged as a nonpareil blues singer—a natural, reclaiming the Delta tradition of Robert Johnson and Son House.

"[13] Howard Reich of The Chicago Tribune wrote that "Blue Light 'til Dawn was so original and haunting that one wondered whether the singer would be able to match it with her next release.

Like its predecessor, New Moon Daughter explores a broad range of musical influences...yet Wilson bridges all of these idioms, and then some, with the incantatory nature of her phrasing, the deep amber quality of her alto and the lush and exotic instrumentation that has marked her work in recent years.

Her take on U2’s Love Is Blindness turned the song into a sumptuous evocation of luminous, primordial sorrow, sculpting a highly original, moving piece of sensual beauty.

[3] Village Voice critic Robert Christgau was less impressed, claiming that too many jazz singers like Wilson "have trouble figuring out what to make of their material" and arguing "most of these songs escape her attentions without a mark on them.