Southsiders (album)

Professional ratings

Aggregate scores
Source	Rating
AnyDecentMusic?	5.4/10[3]
Metacritic	70/100[4]
Review scores
Source	Rating
AllMusic	[5]
Robert Christgau	A−[6]
Consequence of Sound	C+[7]
Exclaim!	7/10[8]
The 405	7/10[9]
HipHopDX	3.5/5[10]
Pitchfork	6.3/10[11]
RapReviews	7/10[12]
Spectrum Culture	3/5[13]
XXL	4/5[14]

Southsiders was met with generally favorable reviews from music critics. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream publications, the album received an average score of 70 based on nine reviews.^[4] The aggregator AnyDecentMusic? has the critical consensus of the album at a 5.4 out of 10, based on seven reviews.^[3]

AllMusic's David Jeffries praised the album, stating: "growth and groundation are skillfully balanced on Southsiders, this is arguably the most deep and different album in the band's discography".^[5] Dan Rys of XXL wrote: "Atmosphere has never been afraid to bare everything, strip things down to their most honest form, and grow with their listeners. Southsiders is the next step in that lineage, and one that falls directly in line with their previous work".^[14]

Mark Bozzer of Exclaim! wrote: "it's a tried, tested and true formula that has allowed these two humble cats from the land where Kirby Puckett smacked homers to do this for so long".^[8] Homer Johnsen of HipHopDX called it "a solid album", resuming "the production is consistent and there are moments of enlightenment from Slug. But due to Atmosphere's already extensive catalog, it doesn’t easily separate itself from previous works".^[10] Patrick Taylor of RapReviews found "it's lines like [in "Flicker" that] keep me coming back to Atmosphere's music, and make Southsiders another solid entry into the Atmosphere catalogue, warts and all".^[12] Nicholas Glover of The 405 called it "extremely competent, and has enough really great beats to more than make up for the general air of insouciance. It's good. It just ain't essential".^[9]

Jayson Greene of Pitchfork concluded: "for the first time in Atmosphere's long career, the stakes feel low, and Southsiders feels both pleasant and noncommittal, like it isn't even convinced of its own right to exist".^[11]

In his mixed review for Consequence, Will Hagle called it "an Atmosphere album, which means that it is going to be better than many hip-hop releases this year, but it’s also exactly what you’d expect from the artists and has moments that feel outdated".^[7]