Her music incorporated hip hop, funk, soul, and jazz elements; NdegéOcello was a fan of Prince, Miles Davis, A Tribe Called Quest, Sly Stone, and Parliament.

[11] Rolling Stone was impressed by NdegéOcello's "mellow, majestic cool" style and "confident, intelligent sexuality", finding it "more potent than any crotch-grabbing shtick".

[12] Fellow Vibe critic Greg Tate hailed it as "the future of the funk" and "the Next Wave in Soul Music",[13] while Brian Keizer of Spin deemed it "the kind of deep soul we need in this decade of disintegration", writing that NdegéOcello explores "the wage-slave pits, projects, and reservations of the present-day Pan-African world" with anger, nihilism, and on the romantic ballads, the "sublime grace" of Stevie Wonder.

[14] Entertainment Weekly was somewhat less enthusiastic, finding some of the singer's lyrics clichéd, the music overly fashionable, and her voice derivative of proto-rap performers such as Gil Scott-Heron, although the magazine said NdegéOcello "delivers her cool cocktail talk with a winning bluesy resignation".

"[15] At the end of 1993, Plantation Lullabies appeared on numerous top-10 lists[9] and was voted the year's 27th best album in the Pazz & Jop, an annual poll of American critics nationwide, published by The Village Voice.

[17] Plantation Lullabies has since been credited as the beginning of the neo soul genre;[1] it was "arguably the first shot in the so-called 'neo-soul' movement", according to Renee Graham of The Boston Globe.

"[9] "NdegéOcello injected hip-hop with the adrenaline of Alternative, organic soul humming with the politics of sex and 'black-on-black love'", Sal Cinquemani wrote in Slant Magazine, calling Plantation Lullabies "the quintessential hip-hop album, mixing the soul of Sly Stone and the funk of James Brown with the pop sensibilities of Prince and the grace of Lena Horne".

[3] Robert Christgau remained relatively unimpressed, citing "I'm Diggin' You" and "Picture Show" as highlights while writing, "deprived of womanist rap, we settle for strong-woman singsong".