Like a River (1993)

This quartet's brand of jazz lite isn't nearly as cloying as the work of Kenny G. When the Yellowjackets really get it going, as on the evocative ''Memoirs'' or the intricate, austere ''1998,'' you could almost mistake this stuff for the real thing. But Like a River mostly sounds like late-period Steely Dan without vocals — intelligent, pleasant, impeccably played, and wholly innocuous. Yellowjackets, where is thy sting? B-