the allmusic site awarded the album 2 stars stating: "many jazz critics hated commercial mann lps like "discotheque" and "waterbed" with a passion, and saw them as examples of a gifted virtuoso dumbing his music down in order to sell more records. but young soul and funk lovers were digging mann and didn't understand why jazz snobs had it in for him. ..."waterbed" is a vocal-oriented soul/funk project first and foremost. in fact, it's one of the strongest commercial albums he recorded ...worth trying to find if you're a fan of 1970s soul/funk".