"Elephant" garnered much critical acclaim upon its release. It received a perfect five-out-of-five-star rating from "Rolling Stone" magazine, and enjoys a 92-percent positive rating on Metacritic. Despite the band's increased fame, Allmusic believed the album "sounds even more pissed-off, paranoid, and stunning than its predecessor... Darker and more difficult than "White Blood Cells"." "Elephant" was additionally notable for premiering Jack's first formal use of guitar soloing, and "Rolling Stone" placed him at number 17 on its list of "100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time". That same year, "Elephant" was ranked number 390 on the magazine's list of the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time. In 2009, the album came in at number 18 in NME's "Top 100 Greatest Albums of the decade". NME referred to the album as the pinnacle of the White Stripes' time as a band and one of Jack White's best works of his career.