Release Therapy

Professional ratings

Aggregate scores
Source	Rating
Metacritic	60/100[1]
Review scores
Source	Rating
AllMusic	[2]
The A.V. Club	B[3]
Robert Christgau	[4]
Entertainment Weekly	B−[5]
The Guardian	[6]
Pitchfork	5.8/10[7]
RapReviews	8.5/10[8]
Rolling Stone	[9]
Stylus Magazine	B−[10]
XXL	[11]

Release Therapy received generally mixed reviews from music critics divided over Ludacris' foray into more conscious rap territory while still being able to deliver mainstream hip-hop content. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the album received an average score of 60, based on 21 reviews.[1]

In a review for The A.V. Club, writer Nathan Rabin called it "Ludacris' most mature album to date," praising the wordy and energetic party tracks and the surprising foray into introspection later on, concluding that "Always good but seldom great, Release Therapy is the rare major-label rap album that suffers from too much substance. Lyrically and thematically, Ludacris is growing up, so perhaps it's inevitable that he's incurring some growing pains along the way."[3] Robert Christgau gave the album a two-star honorable mention, indicating a "likable effort that consumers attuned to its overriding aesthetic or individual vision may well enjoy."[12] He cited "Tell It Like It Is", "Mouths to Feed" and "Slap" as highlights of Ludacris' transition into more mature content while maintaining his humorous side: "Rap porn clown as rap businessman, a richer choice thematically than rap entertainment mogul or rap crime boss."[4] Brett Johnson of XXL gave praise to Ludacris for having a balanced track list containing his trademark humorous party jams and newfound sociopolitical commentary cuts, calling it "a solid album short on obvious club bangers but long on the more worldly perspective of a rap veteran."[11]

Marisa Brown of AllMusic commended the 'Therapy' half of the album but felt that the 'Release' portion of the tracks was missing some humor, saying that "the witty rhymes that made Chicken-n-Beer so great are in short supply."[2] Entertainment Weekly's Michael Endelman was the opposite in his critique of the record, praising Ludacris for maintaining his lyrical humor and dexterity on tracks like "Ultimate Satisfaction" and "Grew Up a Screw Up", but was less positive towards his attempts at depth on "Runaway Love" and "Do Your Time", saying that "[T]hough well-intentioned, they come across as trite."[5] Pitchfork writer Tom Breihan felt the album was overhyped due to various interviews of Ludacris calling it a classic, resulting in a project with a weak track list structure, diluted punchlines and poor attempts at conscious rap. He gave faint praise to Release Therapy as being "Luda's best album since Back for the First Time, but it's not like that's saying much."[7]

The album debuted at number one on the Billboard 200 chart, selling over 309,000 copies in the first week, making it Ludacris' third number one album in a row. To date, the album has sold about 1.3 million copies.[13]