G. Love and Special Sauce

by Ben Sisario

G. Love and crew began in 1994 with a half-baked crossover concept to combine Delta blues with feel-good party hip-hop. Like most attempts to drape the blues in hip new threads, it was an act of vandalism that showed a lack of understanding or respect for the soul of the genre. Since then, they've only spun farther out of control--as Everlast has come along and easily nailed what G. Love had been trying so hard to do in the first place--and ended up in 2001 with rootless, dissolute commercial-soundtrack music that has only the loosest connection to the blues. Electric Mile, the group's fifth album, is a descent into the lowest dancefloor of hell, opening with a faux-reggae why-can't-we-all-just-get-along song called "Unified," which goes, "It could be so nice, but the world is not ready." Not ready for what? Unification? The world seems to be unifying pretty well, and the reason is money, not lame white funk. The "keep on praisin'" refrain on "Praise Up" recalls Stevie Wonder, but there's nothing here that approximates the righteously angry, clear-eyed social commentary of Wonder's "Living for the City" or "Black Man." Instead, Love's political critique is limited to a dismissive, ignorant "all the politicians say is blah, blah, blah." Has this guy ever even picked up a newspaper? There are moments of light on the album, like the misty instrumental "Rain Jam" and the humble, Zeppelin-y acoustic "Sarah's Song," but these are tantalizingly few, since for every one of these there are four or five misguided rants and mind-blown pseudo-epiphanies like "Free at Last" and "Free at Last (Reprise)." D

G. Love and Special Sauce, Sat., April 28, 9pm; Sun., April 29-Tues., May 1, 8pm. $20-$22. Theater of Living Arts, 334 South St. 215.922.1011. www.electricfactory.com.