"The Austin Chronicle"s Taylor Holland wrote that "Ladies and Gentlemen We Are Floating in Space" "adds sunshine to an otherwise dreary summer season for shoegazers" and establishes Spiritualized as "king among loud-minded 'space rock' bands." Rob Brunner of "Entertainment Weekly" described it as "beautifully weightless and way out" and felt that while the band's "zero-gravity guitar drone" can get monotonous, the album's wide array of instrumentation "keep the songs from drifting away altogether." Robert Christgau of "The Village Voice" called the album "refreshingly short on the fatalism pawned off as wisdom by the Verve and depressive if impressive Radiohead", later awarding the album a one-star honorable mention rating, indicating "a worthy effort consumers attuned to its overriding aesthetic or individual vision may well like".