[4] In an interview with musicOMH, Cut Copy guitarist Tim Hoey said, "I guess we finished touring In Ghost Colours, and we wanted to strip away what we'd done before and re-imagine sonically with different synths and guitars.

"[9] Regarding the album's influences, Whitford stated, "I was obsessed with Fleetwood Mac's Tusk while working on this record—a lot of the Lindsey Buckingham tracks have a proto-80s African feel.

[12] A music video for the single was filmed by Kris Moyes in Sydney in November 2010,[11] featuring jungle scenes, an Indiana Jones-style wardrobe and nude models, but it was never released due to production delays.

Peter Gaston of Spin opined that the song "veer[s] into a more conventional-sounding, guitar-bass-drums combination and seemed to indicate a departure from the sleek, electronic-laced sound of In Ghost Colours.

Club wrote that "Cut Copy's music successfully achieves synesthesia on its own throughout [the album]" and that "each arpeggiator pattern, glow-worm guitar line, and percussive thump on Zonoscope bobs in the mix as a luxuriously distinct spot of sound.

"[26] Mikael Wood of Spin noted that the album "catches Cut Copy in a pop-attuned mode they've only hinted at in the past" and that it "works best at its most focused and extroverted, as on the disco-glammy 'Where I'm Going' and 'Need You Now'".

[35] Margaret Wappler of the Los Angeles Times found that "[t]here aren't too many new stones in the pop garden that Cut Copy overturns, but what it roots out is expertly arranged, creating pastiches that raise ghosts from the past while capturing a spirit that's utterly now.

"[29] PopMatters reviewer Timothy Gabriele described Zonoscope as "an album that is, in parts, loose and jammy" and called it "a deviation with mostly good ideas, some great ones, and enough sparkling synth ambrosia and sing-along chorus hooks to get you through.

"[36] The Guardian's Dave Simpson felt that the album is "almost like a mix tape, taking snatches of recognisable songs and blending them together into their own tracks with the aim of creating a greater whole [...] This approach won't win the Aussie electro pranksters awards for originality, but they do it with enough sleight of hand to stay ahead of the lawyers, and it's a lot of fun.

"[28] Rolling Stone's Jody Rosen noticed the influence of bands such as Depeche Mode, Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark and New Order on the album, dubbing it "impressive ventriloquism, and the songs are catchy.

"[33] Rob Webb of NME expressed, "After the ubiquitous presence of '80s-indebted music last year, a follow-up [to In Ghost Colours] with little stylistic deviation isn't a thrilling proposition".