Unity (Shinehead album)

Professional ratings

Review scores
Source	Rating
AllMusic	[12]
The Encyclopedia of Popular Music	[13]
MusicHound R&B: The Essential Album Guide	[7]
The Rolling Stone Album Guide	[8]
Tulsa World	[10]

Trouser Press wrote that Shinehead "continues to mix yankee hip-hop and yardee MC."^[6] The New York Times noted that "Shinehead will drift into a falsetto voice to sing, parody somebody for a second, change the beat–nothing stays the same for long."^[2] The Gazette determined that Shinehead "proves himself one of the most inventive, intelligent rappers on the scene."^[14] The Philadelphia Inquirer concluded that Unity "contains rap, dub-poet toasting, and some of the leanest, most concise vocalizing anywhere in black pop."^[15]

The Washington Post stated: "A striking major-label debut, Unity is as rhythmically limber as it is well-meaning."^[9] The Los Angeles Times determined that "'Hello Y'All' combined a rap-style vocal with hard reggae rhythms ... 'Know How Fe Chat' reversed the equation by setting a patois-laden Jamaican vocal against a funk arrangement."^[16] The Toronto Star deemed the album "a comically-inspired fusion of rap and reggae."^[17]

AllMusic called the album "too lighthearted and positive to catch the ears of hip-hop heads who were beginning to lean on harsher sounds that were developing."^[12] The Chicago Tribune listed Unity as the sixth best album of 1988; the Star Tribune listed it as the fourteenth.^[18][19]