Steppin' Out: The Very Best of Joe Jackson
The two-CDSteppin' Outtrawls the recorded career of an ambitious artist whose work has ranged from reggae-inflected new wave to classical crossover. Cosmopolitan even at his most punky, former Royal Academy of Music student Joe Jackson found his greatest success withNight and Day, a blend of pop and Latin flavors that produced highly memorable tracks such as this retrospective's title song, "Another World," and "Breaking Us in Two." That very sophistication, however, has often proven the downfall of some  Jackson discs and ultimately blurred his musical identity beyond the focus that, say,Elvis Costellohas maintained through many stylistic shifts. Even powerful early music--such as several cuts from 1980's dub-wiseBeat Crazy--is marred by sledgehammer irony, while excerpts from later albums are anything from tastefully bland to downright irritating.--Rickey Wright