Original Soundtrack - Get on the Bus (CD)

All Music Guide

The soundtrack Get on the Bus, Spike Lee's tribute to the Million Man March of 1995, is comprised of new songs from soul and hip-hop arrists as diverse as Curtis Mayfield, D'Angelo, Stevie Wonder, Doug E. Fresh, Blackstreet, the Neville Brothers, Guru and Earth, Wind Fire. Nearly every song is loosely tied into the film's theme of Black Empowerment and social liberation. Even with an explicit political agenda on hand, the music rarely sinks into dogma, simply because these musicians are too talented for that. Much of the music here is first-rate, and the album holds together because of its diversity, not in spite of it. One complaint: Though the advertisements mention it prominently, the song Michael Jackson wrote explicitly for Get on the Bus is left off the soundtrack, per the King of Pop's orders.

- Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Music Guide