Warp on vinyl, compact disc and download. It was Warp's second release by an American musician, following Richard Devine's Lipswitch which had been released in the previous January. The album did not chart in the United States or United Kingdom. Herren was not happy on how the album was promoted, saying: "I couldn't understand why they were treating me like I was 10. They were ignoring all the cultural references that were to be found throughout that first record." He felt the album "would have been easier to package if I'd been from the Bronx. Instead I was from Miami, and lived in Decatur." Critical reception John Bush of AllMusic described the album as "one of the most enjoyable works of experimental techno heard in several years, a combination of tough, underground hip hop and the fractured neo-electro of Warp favorites Autechre and Plaid." Noel Dix of Exclaim! described the album as "a truly remarkable and creative record", praising its unpredictability. Tedd Kessler of the NME called the album "teeth-clattering but exhilarating", writing that "behind every wall of hip hop noise ... there lurks a heart-bursting tune and that's what makes it alluring." Pitchfork wrote that Herren had "painted a portrait of the peculiar state of our urbanity." Reviewing the album alongside two other Warp releases (Plaid's Double Figure and Squarepusher's Go Plastic), Uncut described Vocal Studies as "the pick of this crop" and concluded that it "genuinely seems like a next step for a genre in perpetual need of reinvention." The BBC gave the album a mixed review, stating that "taken as a whole the album is pretty relentless" and the album was "best taken in small doses". PopMatters gave the album a negative review, writing that "the new sounds Herren creates are innovative and entertaining; he simply overdoes it." Legacy and influence Vocal Studies + Uprock Narratives was named as one of the best albums of 2001 by several publications, including Pitchfork, Ottawa Citizen and Rolling Stone. The Globe and Mail named it the seventh best album of the year, with Carl Wilson writing that "of all the electronica-glich-IDM this year, [the album] is the only one I go back to as if it were the Rolling Stones." In 2005, Pitchfork ranked the album the 84th best of 2000–2004. Herren was overwhelmed with the positive reception the album received, exclaiming that "Most of it was so positive, but