In a Funhouse review by Jeff Dove:
"With
Poncho joining Neil on guitar, the band developed a style that I believe
allowed him to create his best music over the years. Previous Crazy Horse
collaborations had power, but Zuma is the beginning of the balance of raw
playing and a clean sound, featuring a perfectly balanced interplay between the two guitars. Similar to Big Star in the early seventies or Television in
the late seventies, there is an amplified noise which doesn't let up on the
energy, but is not overwhelming or excessive."
In an interview in Mojo Magazine in 1995, Neil is asked about Cortez The Killer and where he gets his information:
YOUNG:" It was a combination of imagination and knowledge. What Cortez represented to me is the explorer with two sides, one benevolent, the other utterly ruthless I mean, look at Columbus! Everyone now knows he was less than great and he wasn't even there first (laughs). It always makes me question all these other so-called 'icons' (smiles). "
In an analysis of "Cortez The Killer" lyrics by Wolfgang:
"The better we get to know this supposed paradise, the clearer it gets that it ain't what we thought it could be to us. The line "but they built up with there bare hands / what we still can't do today" is the last, desperate defense, claiming that they were at least good workmen. The last word "today" definitely ends this dream and functions as a bridge to reality, where the narrator is longing for the mysterious "she". I've no idea what this She means in detail, a certain woman or "the woman of my dreams"."
Rustie Mike "Expecting 2 Fly" Cordova posted in the Albums in Order series on Zuma:
"I realized that Zuma was actually recorded before On The Beach, but the music on that and the previous two albums really I felt
could have led to some level of depth in which (banish the
thought) Neil might not even want to record music anymore.
But, I had read a great interview Neil gave to Cameron
Crowe in Rolling Stone Magazine; see it at Michal's Traces.
So, there was some hope. Yet nothing, and I mean nothing
prepared me for how this album would impact my life. Zuma
came out a mere 6 months after TTN (that's what releasing
an album recorded 2 years previously can do for you) and I
think there was something in Neil's muse that compelled
him to put this out. The result is one of the greatest
albums ever by anyone."
Reviews of Neil Young Albums 
Neil Young Archives - Thrasher's Wheat