POP MUSIC REVIEW : Jackson Talks Down to Wiltern Audience

Poor Joe Jackson.

The dapper Englishman wants to be taken seriously as a real musician and composer, not just a pop star. But early in his show at the Wiltern Theatre on Wednesday, as Jackson began a solo piano version of “Nocturne No. 4” from his ambitious new semi-classical “Night Music” album, some guy in the audience shouted out for “Nineteen Forever”--a Jackson song that is, appropriately, a paean to arrested development.

“There’s a Holiday Inn outside of town with a really good band that takes requests,” Jackson said later in response to more shouts for favorites.

It wasn’t so much talking back to the audience as talking down to them. Jackson did the same thing musically, too: The hits were either radically rearranged for Jackson and his versatile three-piece combo or sloughed off in medleys.

Meanwhile, the new album’s wee-hours impressions were spread throughout the show rather than performed in a block, which would have served them better. You got the feeling that Jackson believes his “serious” music is just too good for the masses.

In earthy contrast was opening act the Murmurs--two young guitar-strumming women who were engagingly loopy both in appearance (wildly dyed hair, shiny vinyl trousers) and manner. Heather Grody and Leisha Hailey’s chatty, between-song streams of consciousness offset the aggressive earnestness of their alternafolk songs and won over the wary audience with sheer, goofy charm.