Jasper and the Prodigal Suns
People Get Ready (Cherrydisc/DGC)
by Chris Adams
According to its press release, Jasper and the Prodigal Suns‘ People Get Ready is a soulful pastiche of rap, funk, blues, and reggae that will lead us lost little lambs to “freedom, conciousness-raising (sic), love and togetherness.” (Yeah, and in its free time, the band levitates the Pentagon for kicks.) In actuality, the album sounds like G. Love and Special Sauce (who helped organize the Prods) with a steel drum recorded in a Wheaties box. Breakfast of champions? Me thinks not. More like “breakfast-of-PC-Guatemalan-bag-toting-Inman-Square-types-with-a-taste-for-‘world music’-and-searingly-trite-lyrics” (i.e. “…we got to love one another,” yadda-yadda-yadda.) Thanks, I’ll just have coffee.