The Roach - Critical Reception

Critical Reception

The Chronic received generally positive reviews from contemporary music critics. Rolling Stone's Havelock Nelson wrote that the album "drops raw realism and pays tribute to hip-hop virtuosity." Entertainment Weekly said that it "storms with rage, strolls with confidence, and reverberates with a social realism that's often ugly and horrifying". The Source claimed that Snoop Dogg's "Slick Rick-esque style" produces "new ground for West Coast MCs" and that the album is "an innovative and progressive hip-hop package that must not be missed." USA Today found "Dre's prowess as beat-master and street preacher" to be "undeniable". Jonathan Gold of the Los Angeles Times wrote that, although the rappers lack "quick wit" and "rhythmic virtuosity", Dre's artistry is "on a par with Phil Spector's or Brian Wilson's." Gold argued that, because Dre recreates rather than samples beats and instrumental work, the finished album's fidelity is not inflected by that of "scratchy R&B records that have been played a million times", unlike productions from East Coast hip hop.

In a mixed reivew, Greg Kot of the Chicago Tribune viewed the album as superficial, unrefined entertainment and felt that "Dre combines street potency with thuggish stupidity in equal measure." Robert Christgau, writing in The Village Voice, dismissed it as "sociopathic easy-listening" and "bad pop music" whose innovation lies in Dre's "escape from sampling" rather than the lyrics' "conscienceless naturalization of casual violence." He argued that Dre's inspiration is not contemporary P-Funk, but rather "the blaxploitation soundtrack", which led him to combine trite bass lines with imitations of "Bernie Worrell's high keyb sustain, a basically irritating sound that in context always signified fantasy, not reality—stoned self-loss or, at a best Dre never approaches, grandiose jive."

Retrospective reviews of the album were also positive. Jon Pareles of The New York Times said that The Chronic and Snoop Dogg's Doggystyle "made the gangsta life sound like a party occasionally interrupted by gunplay". Allmusic's Steve Huey compared Dr. Dre to his inspiration, George Clinton, stating "Dre's just as effortlessly funky, and he has a better feel for a hook, a knack that improbably landed gangsta rap on the pop charts". Rhapsody writer Brolin Winning named the album as "an untouchable masterpiece of California Gangsta Rap" and that it had "track after track of G-Funk gems". On Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums of All Time, it was noted that "Dre funked up the rhymes with a smooth bass-heavy production style and the laid-back delivery of then-unknown rapper Snoop Doggy Dogg." Time magazine's Josh Tyrangiel states that Dr. Dre created "a sound that defined early 90's urban L.A. in the same way that Motown defined 60's Detroit". Laura Sinagra, writing in The Rolling Stone Album Guide (2004), said that The Chronic "features system-busting Funkadelic beats designed to rumble your woofer while the matter-of-fact violence of the lyrics blows your smoke-filled mind".