Bruised Orange was panned by The Village Voice, an American news and culture paper, known for being the country's first alternative newsweekly.
Village Voice critic Robert Christgau was cool towards the album in The Village Voice, writing that "...Prine sounds like he's singing us bedtime stories, and while the gently humorous mood is attractive, at times it makes this 'crooked piece of time that we live in' seem as harmless and corny as producer Steve Goodman's background moves...", although he ultimately found Prine's "meaningful nonsense" comparable to and more impressive than Edward Lear's poetry. 
