The Collective (Kim Gordon album)

The album was inspired in part by Jennifer Egan's 2022 novel The Candy House. Producer Justin Raisen sent Gordon several instrumental tracks, over which Gordon sang vocals and added distortion effects. Gordon also said that she wanted the album to be "more beat-oriented" than her last album, 2019's No Home Record.^[2]

Professional ratings

Aggregate scores
Source	Rating
AnyDecentMusic?	7.8/10[3]
Metacritic	84/100[4]
Review scores
Source	Rating
AllMusic	[5]
DIY	[6]
Exclaim!	8/10[7]
The Line of Best Fit	8/10[8]
Mojo	[9]
NME	[10]
Pitchfork	8.5/10[11]
Record Collector	[12]
The Skinny	[13]
Uncut	8/10[14]

The Collective received a score of 84 out of 100 on review aggregator Metacritic based on 18 critics' reviews, indicating "universal acclaim".^[4] The Wire felt that "hard edged synths and massive, crunchy beats lend righteous swagger to Gordon's bleary guitar squalls and jetlagged sprechstimme",^[15] while Mojo opined that "'The Candy House''s garbled distress flare or the My Bloody Neubauten of 'I Don't Miss My Mind' confirm she is still picking up signals nobody else can".^[9] Uncut stated that "there's little identifiable guitar until track five, by which time anxiety and menace have taken hold thanks to the lumbering mien of 'Bye Bye' and 'I'm a Man''s monstrous grind. 'Shelf Warmer' lets in some air but it too is fabulously foul".^[14] Record Collector's Jeremy Allen wrote that on The Collective, "the needle flickers high into the red with layer upon layer of digital distortion and some of the filthiest beats known to man".^[12]

Stereogum named it album of the week, with the website's Chris DeVille writing that the album's "glory" is "the Sonic Youth co-founder's ability to comfortably step into that kind of decayed SoundCloud rap environment while also infusing it with the experimental rock swagger that has been her own signature for over four decades. The screeching, booming, slow-crawling production feels alien to Gordon's catalog, but she makes it entirely her own".^[16] Jack Faulds of The Skinny observed that the album "leans further into the heavy dub and trap stylings introduced on 2019's No Home Record" and "manages to hit that sweet spot, creating an album that is adventurous, charmingly deadpan and visceral at every turn".^[13]

Reviewing the album for Pitchfork, Shaad D'Souza described it as "a maelstrom of mundane thoughts and funny asides and flashes of pure rage whipped into a heavy, unnerving fog. It sounds how TikTok brain feels".^[11] Charlotte Marston of DIY found it to be "a more cut-and-paste type affair" with "Kim continuing to funnel uncomfortable truths through skulking trip-hop sounds and dank industrial rhythms".^[6] The Line of Best Fit's Callum Foulds stated that "There is no one out there doing it like Kim Gordon, and her return to music with The Collective proves that she is still the coolest person in music".^[8]

Oliver Crook of Exclaim! wrote that The Collective "isn't easy to listen to. Its jarring, angular beats—courtesy of producer Justin Raisen—are challenging, the chugging electronics, freewheeling guitar and snarled spoken word at odds with melody".^[7] NME's Jordan Bassett opined that Gordon "balances her less than commercial sensibilities with crunchily on-trend production and relatable lyrics about rotten capitalism and fragile masculinity".^[10] Kory Grow of Rolling Stone called it Gordon's "own unique spin on noisy hip-hop", also stating that "the songs come off as avant-garde, trap, old-school hip-hop, noisy, or musique concrète depending on where you drop the needle".^[17]