[5] Writing in March 2000 for The Village Voice, Robert Christgau applauded the music as an excellent "rock comeback" and a "jumpier and snappier, sourer and trickier and less soothing" iteration of the jazz pop featured on Steely Dan's 1977 album Aja, describing it as "postfunk".

Thematically, he found it unified by fictitious yet revelatory accounts of "dirty old men" seeking "validation" and "excitement" in their sex lives, which are "full of heady infatuations and random acts of cruelty, self-interest and self-hate, vicious cycles blowing hot and cold", all conveying "the urgency of attraction".

[17] Stephen Thomas Erlewine of AllMusic appreciated the "sharp humor" in the lyrics, but was especially impressed by the music's "depth and character", as he observed "nearly endless permutations within their signature sound".

[6] A dissenting view came from Pitchfork reviewer Brent DiCrescenzo, who dismissed the songs as "lengthy, indistinguishable" and "glossy bop-pop" while suggesting Steely Dan lack "soul".

Needless to say, Steely Dan's elliptical character studies set to yacht rock sleaze didn't speak to disaffected American youth the way, say, The Marshall Mathers LP did.