In an interview, Ferraro claimed he had gotten into "weird street fashion" while recording Night Dolls with Hairspray, which led to the album being influenced by glam rock and power pop styles.

[3] According to Nick Richardson of Fact magazine, Night Dolls with Hairspray explores the surfaces of popular media in the 1980s;[7] in doing so, Ferraro creates new bad behaviors for scenarios common in B movies of that decade.

[7] Night Dolls with Hairspray also focuses on how most people positively view an otherwise bad entertainment industry today, where "real teenagers, like Ferraro records, are smelly, acnefied, confused; while Beyonce [sic] is a slick, inhuman cyborg".

"[8] Marc Masters of Pitchfork described it as "remarkably catchy music," writing that fans of artists like Ariel Pink would enjoy the album; he also called it "dizzying" and "nauseating, much the way audiences left The Blair Witch Project more sick from the shaky camerawork than scared by the plot.

"[6] The Pitchfork blog Altered Zones called Night Dolls with Hairspray a "supremely listenable batch of hits" and "so poignant that it'll leave you wondering how you (actually) chuckled at the roach-infested creeps that populated the album.