 Reviewing the album for "Rolling Stone", Jody Rosen said it "warrants a place in that storied lineage" of "Seventies blaxploitation soundtracks and Nineties gangsta rap blaxploitation revivals".In the "Chicago Tribune", Greg Kot applauded Lamar for giving "gangsta tropes ... a twist, or sometimes upend[ing] them completely" on a record that "brims with comedy, complexity and the many voices in Kendrick Lamar's head.