Notably, the album features covers of the songs of the likes of Blind Alfred Reed, the Pilgrim Travelers and the Stanley Brothers alongside three original compositions.

[15][16] In a five-starred 2018 review for The Irish Times, Joe Breen said: "Ry Cooder hasn’t lost the activist voice that drove Election Special, his last new album, just before Obama's re-election, but The Prodigal Son is a softer shade of his political self, more balm than brute force.

"[7] Giving the album four stars, Terry Staunton, writing in Record Collector, said "Cooder astutely plunders the grammar of the nation’s folk music history with remarkable results.

Three of its 11 songs come from his own pen, but elsewhere his archival skills come to the fore, referencing such bygone chroniclers as The Stanley Brothers and Blind Willie Johnson... Key to the album’s success is Cooder’s regular collaborator, son Joachim, with whom he’s worked for close to 25 years.

Serving as intuitive drummer and keen-eared co-producer, he is integral to fashioning a set of songs that while acknowledging the rich tapestry of the US’ folk past ring loud and clear with modern-day truths.