POP MUSIC REVIEW : Poco Is Only So-So in Anaheim Concert

Poco, like the Flying Burrito Brothers, never found the commercial success it deserved because back in 1968 mixing country and rock music was a daring and none-too-profitable endeavor.

Each of those seminal ‘60s Los Angeles bands has been vindicated over time, though each in its own way. The Burritos are just a memory now, but an exalted one, due to Chris Hillman’s and Gram Parson’s iconoclastic collision of rock and country that used the friction between the two to expose some fresh expressive soil.

Poco instead sought the harmony between the two styles, approaching the music with a splendid good-timey sensibility and professionalism. It’s hardly the stuff of legend, but their solid approach did finally hit pay dirt when the original group re-formed last year and recorded the “Legacy” album, which yielded the hit “Call It Love.”

True to its legacy, the reconstituted band delivered a show Saturday at the Celebrity Theatre in Anaheim that was well-executed entertainment, but only rarely captivating.

The album features the full original Poco lineup of Richie Furay, Jim Messina, Rusty Young, Randy Meisner and George Grantham--only steel guitarist Young had stayed with the band over the years. Furay’s high tenor voice is missing from the tour (members claim that there was a conflict with his current occupation as a minister), with rhythm guitarist Jack Sunrud filling in some of his harmony vocals. (They also had an unidentified keyboard player.)

The group didn’t attempt to tackle the songs by Furay or its other past members, which, while making for a truth-in-packaging rare in rock shows, wound up bypassing some of their finest songs. Among the missing were the definitive Poco song “Pickin’ Up the Pieces” and the beautiful, mid-period “Rose of Cimarron.”

What the group did perform was a balanced selection of “Legacy” songs, Poco standards and tunes from its members’ sundered careers. Messina’s current “Loving You Every Minute” proved a serviceable rocker, though his Loggins and Messina hit “Your Mama Don’t Dance” was given a flat boogie rendition and the just-penned “Sinners and Saints” bordered on the interminable.

The Meisner/Eagles classic “Take It to the Limit” was given its due, with some splendid falsetto work from the bassist. The current album’s Richard Marx contribution, “Nothin’ to Hide,” offered some excellent vocal harmonies, which also prevailed during an acoustic segment that included “Crazy Love” and “Who Else.”

Throughout the performance, though, the only element that raised Poco above a comfortable competence was Young’s remarkable playing on his pedal steel and lap steel guitars. Particularly when soaring on his ancient Rickenbacker “frying pan” steel, Young injected an abandon and wild feeling into the music that the other players would have done well to subscribe to.

The performance by show opener Kris McKay suggested that hers is a name to watch. The Austin, Tex.-based singer displayed a big, gutsy voice that also proved capable of some fine phrasing on Billie Holiday’s “Don’t Explain.” Her two original songs showed promise, and until that’s fulfilled, she has an excellent song sense.