Via A.V. Club: “To understand the worldview of Atmosphere’s Fishing Blues, look no further than the title; piscine imagery pops up several times throughout the album. In “Besos,” a cokehead earns the nickname “Blowfish” because his drug habit keeps him from getting it up. Three songs later in “Seismic Waves,” a school of salmon tries to swim upstream in The River Of Pessimism. Finally, on the title track featuring Oakland rapper The Grouch, fishing becomes a means of meditating one’s way through their own hardships. When a fish darts away with Slug’s bait, the loss doesn’t bother him. All three instances are examples of people (or fish as people/people as fish) fighting to swim against the current, to overcome the obstacles in their lives, to persevere—a verb that Slug himself has noted as being a running theme in his work. Sometimes folks are able to get what they want—whether it be love, sex, sobriety, or just a small moment of happiness—and sometimes they’re not. All that matters is that they tried."