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All Music Guide

The record boasts a huge, smooth production and is considerably more varied and accomplished than its predecessor.

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Billboard

On "Mad Season" the band serves up another slick collection of R.E.M. and Pearl Jam-influenced post-grunge classic rock tailor-made for ubiquitous radio play.

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Spin

Each song isn't particularly interesting or life-changing, but, damn, if every one of them doesn't boast a hook that sticks in your head until you're humming "We Wish You A Merry Christmas" just to exorcise it. For better or worse, this is talented songwriting...

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Wall of Sound

Matchbox Twenty never claimed to be original or challenging or anything more than a lightweight and entertaining pop band. Which is why Mad Season, with its rather casual and jammy feel, is so surprising, so substantial, and much more satisfying than expected.

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Village Voice

What lots of people loved about "Push" isn't much in evidence here, but neither is what lots of people hated about it.

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Sonicnet

A relatively bloodless album, a work that seems formatted to satisfy the demands of the marketplace without really transcending them.

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Checkout.com

The band's edge has dulled considerably, in spite of guitarists Kyle Cook and Adam Gaynor's best efforts on "Angry" and "Mad Season," but for the most part they're heavily sedated throughout, as are bassist Brian Yale and drummer Paul Doucette, begging the question: Where's the band?

Q Magazine

The follow-up is an equally passionate, turbulent affair, sounding, oddly, like a cross between Foreigner and the Red Hot Chili Peppers.

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Entertainment Weekly

Especially in its ballad-heavy second half, mad season feels like the rock equivalent of a chick flick.

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Rolling Stone

Every song on Mad Season is a production mini-epic.... Under the haywire production are crafty songs.... But when the crescendos surge and the keyboards chime, he starts to sound as unctuous as 1970s cheeseballs from Lobo to Jim Croce to the Guess Who's Burton Cummings. Songs that probably seemed vulnerable as demos have turned greedily narcissistic.

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The Onion (A.V. Club)

"Last Beautiful Girl"... would be good enough to inspire a wholesale reassessment of Matchbox Twenty if the material surrounding it weren't so average.

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CDNow

There's nothing lasting or substantive about the 12 tracks (plus one hidden one) that make up Mad Season.

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New Musical Express (NME)

Musically this is the sound of middle America at its most ugly and nauseating...

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MTV.com

This new album... sees them mutating into less of a rock outfit and more of what is commonly called "adult contemporary" -- in other words, music for soccer moms and rich yuppies to play really loud in their BMWs-

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What Our Users Said

The average user rating for this album is 8.8 (out of 10) based on 25 User Votes

Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Curefreak gave it an8:
I like the ballads and the mid-tempo stuff but the rockers sound overly processed and over produced and don't really "rock" Rest Stop is probably my favorite song and is probably the most personal.

Jarred T. gave it a9:
I often find myself listening to this album. I've always been a bigger fan of slow sad songs, and that's where this album truly delivers. I just wish there were more of those songs on this album. It males me wonder why so many people continually put down these guys.

kerry m gave it an8:
hmmm if i had listened to critics i would never have bothered, now i am set on discovering matchbox 20 for the great band that they are. Man they get a bad rap from so many people and i just dont understand it!! this album is great.

Nic gave it a9:
The best album of Matchbox Twenty...much better than Yourself of Someone Like You and More than You Think You Are..other critics are so wrong this time

Monique W gave it a5:
I love MB20 and Rob Thomas. Yourself of Someone Like You and More than You Think You Are are fantastic works of art. Unfortuntately, Mad Season is not on par with these albums. On Matchbox twenty's second effort, they lose the charm that makes them so appealing. WIth orchestras and extra noise for no reason, this album is overproduced and hard to listen to. Rob's beautiful voice and lyrical artistry are lost in the cacophony. I'm glad the boys came back from this to make a good solid album with More than You Think You Are. I hope Rob's solo debut will stay in the vein of these gems.

paul gave it a9:
one of the only albums in which i love almost every song!

Zach S gave it a7:
The production on this album is absolutely gorgeous. Big step in the right direction: in fact, they could have gone even farther with the orchesta and relied less on guitars. Unfortunately, the songwriting is only so-so. There's only so many ways for Rob Thomas to lament lost love, and this record goes over by about ten songs.

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