The album included the singles, "Got the Time" (a Joe Jackson cover) and "In My World" (which was performed by the band on the Married... with Children episode, "My Dinner with Anthrax").

Abandoning the humor and comic book references which were common on their previous albums, the lyrical focus of Persistence of Time is the need for tolerance and peace.

The band also introduced a progressive side of the music which had not been present in their earlier work, while also placing a reduced emphasis on typical thrash metal elements such as fast tempo and aggression.

"The more cartoonish side of the band" is substituted by a "dark, uncompromising examination of society's dirty underbelly", which makes Persistence of Time "their most lyrically consistent album".

[5] Kim Neely of the American magazine Rolling Stone underlines the social tone of the lyrics and describes Persistence of Time as "a foray into the dreary, gray bowels of urban hell", praising singer Joey Belladonna for "railing against every societal ill known to city-bred man".