Most of this go around of Quickies is about catching up on some of the more recent big name releases. Spending so much time off the main highway of current music, I sometimes need to get back on it to regain a sense of where the mainstream is to begin with. Well, "mainstream" from the perspective of the middle-aged, anyway. And as I am often reminded, the mainstream still has interesting and worthwhile music to offer. Just not quite as often, that's all.

One of those "big name" CD's I gave a spin is the new offering by Lenny Kravitz, It Is Time for A Love Revolution. Aside from the "The Immigrant Song" soundalike "Love Love Love," this record just didn't grab me, so, I'm not going to write about it. Oops, too late! Oh well, here's the rest in greater detail. But before getting on that main thoroughfare of popular sounds, our journey starts on a dusty road in west Africa:

Akoya Afrobeat P.D.P.

Some large ensembles pay lip service of being multi-cultural and international but Akoya lives up to the billing more than any other acts I've come across lately. This 13-piece ensemble is comprised of members hailing from Panama, Ghana, Benin, South Africa, Japan, and the USA. The lead singer Kaleta is a veteran of Afro-beat legend Fela Kuti's Egypt 80 band. This group sports a five-piece horn section, four percussionists, two backing vocalists and four guitarists. One of those guitarists just happens to be Ryan Blotnick, an up-and-coming jazzer from Maine who Mark Saleski profiled here recently.

So, with all these influences in the band, the product is predictably of a worldly nature, but it's predominantly African blended in with American seventies-style funk and a hint of fusion. Kind of like what you might get if you were to blend Kuti with James Brown, Bob Marley, and occasionally, some Soft Machine. The jams are all extended, ten-plus minute pieces that hold it together for so long with deep grooves, multilingual shouts by Kaleta and the occasional jazzy solo by the keyboardists or a guest sax player.

This makes for a great party record that doesn't require a party to enjoy. P.D.P. hits the street on March 1.

Joe Jackson Rain
At least in the beginning, Jackson's music career took the same path as Elvis Costello's: an angry young new-waver turned serious pop meister. Joe eventually lost me (and many others) when his music got too orchestral and heavy for his own good. Lately, he's been going back to his original sound with his original band and while Volume 4 was a more obvious return to his youthful form, Rain's absence of a guitarist makes Jackson lean more on his piano. Since that's one of greatest strengths, it's a welcome wrinkle.

Anyone who has come of age with pop music in the nineties instead of the eighties are likely to call Rain a Ben Folds Five tribute, especially when they hear the opening "Invisible Man" or "King Pleasure Time." Of course, it's Folds who owes much of his aggressive piano-pop style to Jackson, not vice versa. Jackson's songwriting even today reveals a subtle depth that few could quite match, though. There's a certain Burt Bacharach-esque way in his chord progressions within tunes like "Wasted Time" that you don't hear much of anymore. The breezy piano bar jazz of Night And Day is back, as in numbers like "The Uptown Train."