I very much prefer Rake for orchestrating multiple build systems in a web project or dependency installation or just any sort of scripting. It comes with a simplified interface to shelling out that will print out the commands you are calling.

If for some reason the project is ruby allergic, I'll try to use Invoke [0].

Sometimes I feel like people's usage of Make in web projects is akin to someone taking an axe and hand saw out to break down a tree for firewood when there are multiple perfectly functioning chainsaws in the garage.

[0] http://www.pyinvoke.org/