I could hardly do anything less than swoon over [Smokey,] … Robinson's first solo album…. ["Holly"] is a melodramatic "Lucy in the Sky," and "Just My Soul Responding," only more Motown current-affairs "relevance," but these are petty complaints. "Holly" glows in spite of its daytime TV story and "Just My Soul Responding" has the strength and conviction to overcome lines like, "Now I'm on a reservation livin' in a state of degradation." No one but Smokey can make a song based around astrological signs ("The Family Song," about his own family) or yet another my-girl-and-my-best-friend song ("Silent Partner in a Three-Way Love Affair") work so well…. ["Wanna Know My Mind"] is another Robinson gem, frothy but never flimsy. All this … and I am swooning.

Vince Aletti, "For the Record: 'Smokey'," in Rolling Stone (by Straight Arrow Publishers, Inc. © 1973; all rights reserved; reprinted by permission), Issue 147, November 8, 1973, p. 76.