Health setbacks behind him, Jon Anderson sings an upbeat tune

Over the past couple years, some performance reviews have characterized Jon Anderson as looking frail. And noted that his distinctively pure, angelic tenor voice sounds grainy, even a tad wobbly.

You won't hear such naysaying from the man himself, though. From his own perspective, the longtime front guy of the British prog rock supergroup Yes is "healthier than I've been in years" and "singing the best I ever have," he shared in a recent call sparked by a solo show Wednesday at TLA, where he'll sing and play guitar, mountain dulcimer, ukelele and piano.

Anderson's most recent album "The Living Tree," recorded with longtime collaborator (and sometime Yes keyboardist) Rick Wakeman, is chock full of songs of self-actualization, of taking charge and "learning to love again, learning to love yourself."

And we're guessing more power of positive thinking will arise in this blissfully busy bee's next album, likely to be previewed in his recital here. That set's called "Survival and Other Stories" and has been put together "with people all around the world - Canada, Italy, Germany, France, Eastern Europe - communicating on the Internet," Anderson said from his homebase in California.

"I do a lot of work that way now, trading files. Rick [Wakeman] sends me chords, other people send me backing tracks, and if the energy is there, I write from that. I'm constantly creating, and posting material on my official site [www.jonanderson.com]. Last week I posted one called 'Surfing With God.' A beautiful song. You should check it out."

Two years ago, Jon Anderson suffered an asthma attack so severe and sudden "I nearly drowned." He was diagnosed with "acute respiratory failure," the man shared without going into the gruesome details. Anderson would allow that he "needed six operations" and was off his game for months.

During that time, his longtime bandmates decided to go out on the road again with a new singer, a guy plucked (shades of Judas Priest) from a Yes tribute band. "This is not Yes," a "disrepected" Anderson would later grouse in a blog. Only one member of the group, Alan White, had even bothered to inquire about his health, he added. Yet in the next breath Anderson wished them all well in their "solo work."

Today, this eternal "all you need is love" spirit-child opines, "You need to go through that stuff to come out the other end. It's like going to a Jiffy Lube. Now I'm ready for the next 30 years. I'm singing better and don't have any asthma problems and watching what I'm doing, how I'm living, what I'm eating. If you're not looking out for your body, you're not watching out for your spiritual stuff."

At least a couple songs on "The Living Tree" reference the thoughts of a "spirit lady." And in the album's credits Anderson pays overt homage to Audrey Kitagawa as his spiritual-guidance counselor. The Divine Mother of the Light of Awareness International Spiritual Family and a former practicing attorney, Kitagawa "is part of the lineage of Sri Ramakrishna [a 19th-century Indian sage] and of Paramahansa Yogananda," the first yoga master of India to become a missionary to the West.

"I got into Yogananda during the 'Tales from Topographic Oceans' period. [Yes released that album in 1973.] I was looking for understanding of life, new understanding of Mother Earth and nature. When I was in school, I was scared to death of the Holy Ghost, that concept someone was watching me all the time, watching to see if I do anything wrong. The fear that the church puts in young people is stupid. It has nothing to do with enlightenment. . . . When I first met [Kitagawa], the first thing she said was, 'God is free and God has no religion. I said 'I like that.' "

In his 66th year, Anderson is doing his best to avoid becoming "old and farty." While those other Yes guys "have not really been interested in the last 10 years in any big ideas I proposed, I still like adventure in music, just making good music."

And it pleases him no end that Kanye West sampled his "In High Places" (a collaboration with Mike Oldfield) on West's recent hit album "Dark Fantasy."

"I'm kind of hip now, a hip dude," Anderson mused with a chuckle. "In fact, I did a rap opera 20 years ago. I wrote it in '91 - a great idea, based on 'Antigone,' the Greek tragedy. I'm going to get it finished later this year."

Was that one of the infamous projects that Anderson's then label, Geffen, rejected as noncommerical?

"You hit the nail on the head. It was very frustrating at the time. You think you're writing music people will hear, then they don't. But eventually it gets out. There are a couple bootlegs floating around of my stuff that didn't officially get out. I don't mind. Gotta get on your with your life. Just got to move on, man."

TLA, 334 South St., 8 p.m. Wednesday, $45/$48, 800-745-3000, www.livenation.com.