POP MUSIC REVIEW : UB40 Stages Push-Button Performance

How can a group as bland as UB40 come from the same city that produced such raucous forces as Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath and Judas Priest? Why does Chrissie Hynde keep recording duets with this group? Is she into helping the needy? Should a band that thinks it’s cool to do a reggae remake of “I Got You Babe” be allowed to exist?

Most to the point, why is UB40 so popular with the white-bread, KROQ-bred audience? At the band’s Greek Theatre show on Wednesday, dreadlocks were as scarce as at the Republican National Convention. The reggae audience is apparently splitting as it grows, with these well-scrubbed kids supporting the milder, usually English brand while the “roots” fans save their money for Andrew Tosh and Burning Spear.

The octet’s push-button performance Wednesday--the first of two dates at the Greek, followed by a Pacific Amphitheatre show tonight--unfolded uneventfully, with a snappy opening instrumental and one segment of forceful, Spectorian reggae standing out.

But the band rarely cut a groove deep enough to release the rich, dank vapors of great reggae, and it lacked the hyperactive verve of its English ska brethren like the Specials and the Beat. None of the voices carry any weight, though Astro’s rapid-fire “toasting” stirred things up a couple of times. Personality was similarly minimal, and there seemed as much passion in their many shouts of “Hello, L.A.” and in hawking their new album as in their one political statement, an attack on South Africa.

The second-billed Dan Reed Network presented the curious spectacle of a white hard-rock Gypsy--flanked by black bassist and guitarist--doing funny little Jethro Tull kicks and hand flourishes while delivering an assortment of hard-funk and R&B-pop; tunes. It was too stagy and contrived for its own good, and the Portland-based singer needs to move from Prince and Ohio Players to his own turf. But he has an unforced appeal as a performer, and he obviously has good taste.