Let’s get a couple things straight: Terence Trent Howard, a.k.a Terence Trent D’Arby, a.k.a. his latest name–which came to him in a dream–Sananda Francesco Maitreya, is a certifiable nut. He also doesn’t seem to have someone in his entourage who can reel in his nutty musical impulses, which leads to peculiar interludes, asides, giggling, and soliloquies in his recordings. He likes making weird concept albums, rock-opera things that sound like what might happen if Wilson Pickett were fronting Styx.

Yet his voice is beautiful, powerful, and rough. His grasp of soul singing is extraordinary; he can effortlessly flit from gospel to jazz to hard funk to pop to Memphis-style soul shouting, and even pull off late-’60s psychedelic soul, which was pretty weird to begin with but yet he makes it sound cool. He’s kind of like Prince, except more flawed in a Sun Ra kind of loony way (both D’Arby and Ra had issues with U.S. Army service, so they have that in common). (more…)