The album's lead single "Jerry Was a Race Car Driver" is known for its intricate bassline that Les Claypool played on a fretless six-string bass using the tapping technique.

The single "Tommy the Cat" is also characterised by its highly complex bassline that mixes strumming and slapping; there is not a clear consensus on exactly what notes are being played, and as a result, numerous different interpretations exist on the Internet.

[3] Reviewing Sailing the Seas of Cheese for the Chicago Tribune, Greg Kot wrote that Primus "explore funk 'n' rock with bemused brilliance" and that "its musicianship, blending velocity with virtuosity, continues to set it apart from the crowded pool of punk-funk bands.

called the album "as viciously strange an offering as any to come from a major label all year" and commented that Primus were "working without the shackles of genre" and "immersing the listener in the mire of their own hyper-reality.

"[7] NME critic Stephen Dalton credited Primus for avoiding self-indulgence and "avant-wank fusion",[8] while in Entertainment Weekly, Simon Reynolds said that the band are "too self-consciously goofy for their own good, but their rubber-boned thrash-funk can be cartoonish fun.

"[6] In a retrospective review for AllMusic, Steve Huey contends that "Sailing the Seas of Cheese completely redefined the possibilities of the electric bass in rock music for those who'd never heard the group before."

He notes that "the willful goofiness may alienate some listeners, but ... it never detracts from the band's frequently stunning musicianship" and concludes that the album is "the tightest, most song-oriented representation of their jaw-dropping, one-of-a-kind style.