Master and Servant about the song includes a mixing duration of seven days, and after all the reworking and final mastering of the mix, they realized they left the channel with the snare drum muted during the last chorus. Some of the sounds on "Master and Servant", such as the whip effect, are based on Daniel Miller standing in the studio hissing and spitting. According to the band, they tried to sample a real whip but "it was hopeless". The "Slavery Whip Mix" was the longest 12" Depeche Mode song at the time, with the outro being turned into a swing version of
Confessions of a Pop Group Eighties: One Day, One Decade", journalist Dylan Jones described "Confessions of a Pop Group" as the pinnacle of the band's career, and that Weller's only problem "was convincing other people that this was the case." Several writers have placed "Confessions of a Pop Group" within different contexts, both socially and within Weller's career. Writer Paolo Hewitt wrote that the album was Weller's attempt to obtain complete musical freedom, "not answering to anyone," describing it as "the strangest record Weller ever involved himself in." Liberal politics magazine the "New Statesman" found the album to provide proof that left-leaning bands in Britain