Neil McCormick wrote about "Zooropa", "It feels like a minor work, and generally U2 don't do minor. But if you're not going to make the Big Statement, you're maybe going to come up with something that has the oxygen of pop music." In 1997, "Spin" wrote, ""Zooropa" took U2 as far from the monastic mysticism of "The Joshua Tree" as they could go. It freed U2 from itself." Edna Gundersen of "USA Today" said in 2002, "the alien territory of "Achtung Baby" and "Zooropa" cemented U2's relevance and enhanced its cachet as intrepid explorers". In 2011, "Rolling Stone" ranked the record at number 61 on its list of "100 Best Albums of the Nineties".