Chris Berry was just a boy living in California when he was first exposed to African music, a shoplifted Fela Kuti album taken from his neighborhood music store.

"My friend went in there to grab something and he didn't really know what he was getting," Berry said in an interview last week from Lake Tahoe. "He brought it out and we thought it sounded strange but interesting so we put it in and played it."

The recording was life changing for the future musician.

Kuti's Afrobeat rhythms started Berry on a path that led him from African drum classes in high school to trips to Africa to an extended stay in Zimbabwe — 10 years on and off — to learn the African thumb piano, the mbira, from area masters.

"I traveled to Africa originally with my drum teacher, Titos Sompa," Berry said. "But I kind of split off from him once I was over there. I was enthralled by mbira music, which was in Zimbabwe, so that's where I decided to go. I didn't know anyone there. I just followed the music.

"I was able to visit many teachers around the country. As long as I showed them respect they were totally willing to teach me. Each had their own style and belief system, a different way they played. But I wanted to learn so bad. It wasn't easy, but I had the desire."

It was in Zimbabwe that Berry formed the first incarnation of his band Panjea, a group that blended pop rhythms taken from all over the continent.

Now back in the States, he brings Panjea to Plush on Monday.

Berry said he loved living in Africa, but there were several reasons for him to come home. For one, he said, it is next to impossible to churn out an adequate living as a musician in Zimbabwe. Berry also wanted to bring back a message of peace with his music, the concept that we are all in this together as one race, the human race. It's a message that is echoed loud and clear on his album, "Dancemakers," released earlier this year on Wrasse Records. Boiling over with "bombastic beats, phat brass and revolutionary lyrics," according to the L.A. Times, "Dancemakers" is 12 tracks of African pop rhythms and traditional instruments mixed in with a little bit of reggae flavor.

"You'll hear a lot from the album at the concert," Berry said. "I feel like the torch has been passed on from people like Bob Marley and the Police and other musicians who were singing about real things with messages. There is even some Bob Dylan in there."

Berry plans on using a chunk of the money he makes on tour and with his album to help fund his nonprofit organization, The Panjea Foundation, based out of Zimbabwe.

"It is a vehicle for me to help and give back," he said. "We are creating a 21st-century village that mixes the best of both Western and African concepts. It's an African village with technology like solar energy and organic farming, a sustainable living center with tons of art and culture."

And at the rate he's going, Berry might make a significant dent in his fund-raising efforts by year's end. The singer used to perform stadium shows back in Africa but is amazed at the number of people who show up to his club dates in the States, especially since the group is still fairly new here.

Berry attributes part of the recognition to the other U.S.-based groups out there performing African-flavored music. Tucson has seen several in the past year, including North Carolina's Toubab Krewe and New York City's Antibalas Afrobeat Orchestra.

"I hear about a lot of African-influenced bands starting up here," Berry said. "I really think African music is really starting to flourish in the States. It is no longer seen as some faraway thing. It is getting more accessible. And people are getting it. They are far more accepting now."