 In a less enthusiastic review for MSN Music, Robert Christgau gave Life Is Good a three-star honorable mention, citing "Daughters" and "Accident Murderers" as highlights and deeming the record "reflections of a bigshot who, as he mentions several times, is damn big". AllMusic's David Jeffries called it a "puff-chested bitch session" and felt "Nas needed to get [this album] out of his system, acting as a clearing house for all venom and bile, plus some gloss that doesn't fit but needed to go as well." New York Times critic Jon Caramanica felt his narratives were "sometimes distractingly fanciful" and his lyrics occasionally "overstuffed", even though the record possessed "a simulacrum of the sound that made him legendary". Matthew Fiander from PopMatters was more critical, finding the production "uneven" and calculated "as product", with "half-done ideas".
