In Brief

* Steve Perry, “For the Love of Strange Medicine,” Columbia. Is it the familiar soaring voice (which so often falls splat! )? The overwrought, self-congratulatory solos? The hit single (“You Better Wait”) about a runaway teen-age “beauty queen,” sung/panted by a middle-aged occasional rock star? Something sells the former Journey frontman’s records, but discerning pop music fans shouldn’t waste a minute trying to figure out what.

New albums are rated on a scale of one star (poor), two stars (fair), three stars (good) and four stars (excellent).