"Somewhere between repellent, hilarious and just plain ridiculously stupid."
San Francisco Bay Guardian

"Paving the way for Wolf Eyes to make noise safe and fashionable for the MySpace generation."
Pittsburgh City Paper

"Musik die wie ein Faustschlag voll in den Magen geht."
Dresdner Kulturmagazin (DE)

"Is this guerrilla performance art? Am I on a hidden-camera TV show? Am I just stupid for not 'getting it'? Are you fucking kidding me? These are all normal reactions and seemingly a part of the grand concept that the E.S.P.-ers have been pimping for a decade."
Cincinnati CityBeat

"These longtime Minneapolis noise merchants dress up in ridiculous costumes, make sounds that will automatically loosen your stool and throw household appliances at each other."
Go-Go Magazine (Denver)

"As Cock E.S.P. has eloquently proved throughout their career, it's hard to take anything too seriously when it includes someone in a donkey mask humping an amplifier."
Columbus Alive

"Splattering digital distortion and synapse-cauterizing electrospasms across your frontal lobe like some psychotic Jackson Pollock, Cock E.S.P. isn't the kind of band your mom wants you to like."
Willamette Week (Portland OR)

"Every genre of music needs their court jesters, those brave enough to step up and question the prevailing wisdom. In the loosely defined underground genre of 'noise,' Cock E.S.P. has assumed this mantle of responsibility."
The Scene (London, Ontario)

"There are folks spending a lot of money to convince us that the logical endpoint of indie rock is a market glut of plodding, vaguely tormented riff rockers. But in small dumpy rooms everywhere, the idiom is getting a real Viking funeral from noise artists chewing up the music and joyfully spitting back the debris. Cock E.S.P. crams smutty, snotty manifestos into nasty, brutish, short sets. I recommend safety goggles, ear plugs and punctuality."
Chicago Reader

"Confrontational and potentially dangerous, not only to an unsuspecting audience, but to themselves."
The Scene (London, Ontario)

"Det kunstneriske understrekes også med kyllingdrakter, blod, toppløse maskerte damer og annet performancetull. Så får du heller låne hørselsvernet til naermeste baby imens."
Dagbladet Fretag (Oslo)

"Dain-bramaged."
Boston Phoenix

"Minneapolis' Cock E.S.P. sound a bit like Radiohead - if Radiohead played an amplified cement mixer and forced Thom Yorke to shriek indecipherable obscenities in a donkey outfit while attacking his bandmates."
Nashville Scene

"Minneapolis' Cock E.S.P.might be called underground or performance art, but is more likely a joke."
Rochester Democrat and Chronicle

"Minneapolis' Cock E.S.P. haven't quite become footnotes in the subcultural encyclopedia a la Merzbow or Whitehouse, but not for lack of effort or notoriety."
City Paper (Baltimore)

"A borderline-beautiful display of human wreckage."
Rochester City Newspaper

"Fairly enjoyable audio pain."
LA Weekly

"I did not feel safe as these costumed crusaders began hurling large chunks of metal at the audience. The effect they had upon people was comparable to a natural-disaster."
Icon Weekly (Iowa City)

"The Twin Cities' only 'pure noise' band that anyone outside Minnesota would know."
City Pages (Minneapolis/St. Paul)

"Like a tornado."
Miami New Time

"A collage full of sound and fury."
City Pages (Minneapolis/St. Paul)

"If Extreme Championship Wrestling were a noise band, it would be Cock E.S.P."
Time Out New York

"Self-destructs in as little as 30 seconds."
Village Voice

"Cock E.S.P. spurts harsh, lacerating shards of white noise with a torture-artist's malevolent sense of humor."
Willemette Week (Portland OR)

"På dét punkt er Cock E.S.P. sandelig grænseoverskridende: En hysterisk eksplosion af dårlig smag og dårligere manerer, der ikke kan undgå at få én til at reagere!"
Geiger (DK)

"Almost dumb enough to be Falco."
CMJ

"May not fit into most people's idea of 'music' and you sure as hell can't fuck to it."
Oui

"Horridly obnoxious sounding."
Flipside

"An interesting listen."
Industrial Nation

"Semen-encrusted fun for the whole family."
Torso

"A two-man noise comedy performed at ground zero during a bombing run."
Alternative Press

"Harsh electronics, grating noises, and spookily inhabited wastelands of sonic detritus."
Dusted

"Sonic hurricanes."
Artforum

"Squirming ugliness."
The Wire

"If brevity is the soul of wit, then the 99 remixes of Cock ESP on Hurts So Good must be the wittiest music ever produced."
Brainwashed Brain

"There is never a boring moment."
Vital Weekly

"Cock E.S.P. kick up a racket that never sticks around long enough to irritate and after the first few tracks shows the kind of irreverent illogic that only a man in a donkey suit could really deliver."
Brainwashed Brain

"Somebody like Merzbow, or even Cock E.S.P. (I realize i'ts an exercise in absurdity) are at the point where they should simply be a concept, or a theory. To turn it into a business is a joke."
Assume Power Focus (Hydra interview)

"Just as confrontational and extreme and aggressive as anyone else who grew up preening to Godbullies records."
Bananafish

"Cock E.S.P. are what they are."
In the Fence of Reality

"Unbearable and tedious."
Muckraker

"I have never bothered to follow this band, and this hasn't convinced me that I missed out on anything."
Worm Gear

"I wish some of the tracks were longer because they do have an interesting feel, light hearted but seriously executed it would seem. I thought the last thing submitted by this project was pretty half hearted, and never felt compelled to check them out over their long presence in the Noise scene, but I quite enjoyed this."
Worm Gear

"If it takes, on average, less than three minutes to make a point, without really making a point, then by most standards, Cock E.S.P. is the perfect pop band. Why endure some cliche-ridden, agonizing three minute Britney Spears song, or, for that matter, 20 minute Merzbow song when you can get the same sort of intensity in a minute and a half?"
SuperSphere

"My chair never knew what hit it."
Autoreverse

"Smoke machines, a large Norwegian crooner, body slams, hair pulling, rapid noise, and buh! the next show was cancelled due to injuries."
Dusted Features

"Hearty enough to eat with a spork."
Aiding & Abetting

"Unlike the works of noise artists such as Merzbow or Masonna, 'Hurts So Good' is actually enjoyable.."
Finding Datura

"Destructo-electronics dementia."
Chain the Door

"There really is some talent required to make such an overwhelming clamor. It's hard to offend virtually everyone, but Cock E.S.P. manages to do so, from their name to the title of the albums to the guitar squelch codas to the live show audience members yelling, they manage to rub me the wrong way in just that right way. Right now, I'm listening to them on my portable CD player with the headphones lying on the desk, and you know what? It's still remarkably unpleasant! Destroy all music indeed."
Royal Journal

"Sure to annoy parent and neighbor alike."
Devin's Noise Corner

"Funny enough the first couple times, but tends to get boring rather quickly."
Sinkhole

"Man, this is some powerful racket."
Gajoob

"Cock E.S.P. sounds like these guys want to be like Masonna but can't make it.."
Inferno

"A sad bunch of twats."
Infinite Monkey

"Cock E.S.P. is a force in music that is hard to describe and even harder to tolerate."
Generation

"Lotta people breaking stuff and falling down onstage these days . . . it's that Cock E.S.P. influence."
Blastitude

"I couldn't discern much difference in the crackly feedback whatever the demented duo did."
Lincolnzine

"Likely to appeal to heavy drinking idiots."
Dark Ambient News

"Cock E.S.P. is what I like to call 'idiot noise.'"
Noise in America

"I was disappointed with the brevity of the set and lack of female nudity"
Human is Filth

"A bunch of crap and a waste of time."
Quacky & Pigley's Big Huge Club

"Cock E.S.P. release the sounds latent in every object, unbinding the inanimate's capacity for generating dissonance and psychic confusion. Their approach to their instruments and recording equipment closes the distance between use and misuse."
Listen.com

"Ovo was fantastic and Cock E.S.P. was great. When the noise bands just sprinkle in a little bit of performance or--if you're real lucky--some good rhythms, they magically go from unbearable to awesome."
LiveJournal

"The highlight of seeing Cock E.S.P. last night? I’d have to say it was getting to slow dance w/ Elyse after Cock E.S.P.’s set. She was pretty hammered and wandered into the audience after their set and grabbed me out of my chair to dance. Oh, and did I mention she was only wearing a bra and knickers? Ohhhh yea; in your face everyone else."
LiveJournal

"Hilarious, Cock E.S.P. drove 16 hours non-stop, unloaded their kit, and dressed as a cock and bear before they physically fought each other, the result being a huge backflip onto a chair which collapsed leaving the bear nearly unconscious. All of this took 27 seconds."
Un-Peeled

"I have to say right now that Idon't really like the names that a lot of these people come up with for their projects. Names like, for example, Smegma and The Haters and Cock E.S.P. smack, to me, of a puerile punk attitude that I think sort of demeans the end product. Although sometimes Cock E.S.P. can be interesting.."
Cottsweb

"The sexiest noise performance art crew who ever ruined a theater forever."
My Portland

"They rolled around on the floor screaming and kicking chairs and lighting around for a few minutes. That was pretty descent showmanship..."
Noiseboard433

"Cock E.S.P. on the other hand are a bunch of whiney junkies who played for 2 minutes, broke a bone and bled all over the place... They sucked... I dont care what The Wire says, Cock E.S.P. SUCKED!"
Pataphysics Lab

"I once saw the fat fella from COCK E.S.P. attack and wrestle an amplifier with a GIRL dressed as goldie lox tied to his back...this went on for 3 minutes. I think that NOSIE ARTISTS that take themselves too seriously are retarded (Aube, I'm looking at you). The idea of NOISE as a genre is sort of absurd, COCK ESP embraced the absurd, and it was awesome. But then again I saw MERZBOW and it was fucking beautiful, NO THEATRICS..just straight up onslaught of brain melting tones. It can go either way. I've seen COCK ESP a couple of times...each time it was totally different...I never had the notion to buy their music or listen to it in the discomfort of my own home...but I would go see them in a second. Is it good noise? I'd say no, because it lacks the dimension / tones / nuances that Merzbow or Whitehouse have. Was it a great performance? TOTALLY!!"
Pataphysics Research Journal

"Cock E.S.P. were two guys, one with a chicken mask and one with a donkey mask, thrashing sequencers while the girl singer stripped dowon to her underwear and yelled a lot. It was only 5 minutes long and it was better then it sounds."
Driftless Pony Club

"As open-minded as I am, I thought Cock E.S.P.'s music was marginal at best and their stage show merely a bunch of tweeked-out non-musicians in some sort of free-form jerk-off. Snooozzze."
TCPunk

"Cock E.S.P. fucking ruled. Elyse hit me on the head with her wand, then started stripping and was looking me in the eyes the whole time. Then she kissed me on the cheek and said she wanted to fuck me, but Ilooked 15..."
LiveJournal

"Cock E.S.P. manage to destroy both speakers and egos. The band's unbelievably juvenile and self-loathing antics are served up hand-in-hand with their unintentionally intricate and beautiful noise."
Listen.com

"I had my music exam today... boring as hell and harder than the mocks, but still do-able. The music on it was crap though. I swear one of the pieces was that Cock E.S.P. thing Muse sent me. ~shudder~"
Anime Scores

"I bet this is Alec Empire's shagging music."
Norman Records

"Possibly the most intense show that I've seen since I saw GG Allin in '93."
Big Pete, Pittsburgh

Hannah: I hear screaming at the top of his lungs.

Katie: It's a band that's got all messed up, a really weird jail where they torture people. Ohh, it sounds like someone just got their head cut off!

Hannah: Someone in jail / someone cooking.

Katie: Uuuuh?! Testing... testing.

Hannah: Someone shutting a door.

Katie: Get awaaay!

Hannah: Somebody swearing!

Katie: I heard the s-word!

Hannah: I heard the f-word! Umm, someone saying the b-word.

Katie: Ahhh! We have a problem. This is really weird - like a guitar being tampered with... horrible screaming sound.

Hannah: I hear loud noises.

(At this point Katie is rolling on the floor clutching her ears.)

Katie: Oh, this sounds like the music of Tony Hawk Pro Skater.

Hannah: I hear screaming.

Katie: Yeah, it sounds like the devil. Are those drums?

Hannah: Drums? Someone said "Hello."