David Johansen’s Move Into Old-Time R&B; Lacks the Spark of His Rock ‘n’ Rouge Days

More than a decade after he formed the colorful New York Dolls, David Johansen is still dressing up in funny clothes and imitating other people’s music.

With the Dolls in the early ‘70s, Johansen, a man with a wonderfully expressive face and elastic voice, tried to become a pop star by adopting a teasing rock ‘n’ rouge persona and singing about teen alienation in an exaggerated Rolling Stones manner.

The result was a split decision. Johansen’s Dolls were too outrageous for conservative rock radio programmers at the time, but the group’s approach was prized by rock critics and some adventurous fans who welcomed any attempt to restore personality and spunk to what had become a frightfully sedate rock scene.

Now--as lounge singer Buster Poindexter--Johansen is trying to achieve stardom by putting on a tux and singing about adult foibles in an equally exaggerated salute to pre-rock R&B; and other soul music offshoots. He got a good start with the persona live--mostly in New York clubs and on “Saturday Night Live”--and he now has transferred it to a just-released RCA album titled “Buster Poindexter.”

Again the results are mixed--but in a different way. However well the routine may work live, it has problems on disc.

You can see why the Poindexter character interested Johansen. Much like Bette Midler’s early concert performances, there is an almost liberating quality beneath the aggressively entertaining nature of what Johansen-as-Poindexter is doing: the employment of innocence and joviality of one musical era to more easily examine some contemporary emotions and attitudes of another.

Johansen, 37, doesn’t just sing “Smack Dab in the Middle,” the opening track on the album. He struts his way through the song about the ultimate party animal, setting a playful tone for the rest of the album.

The words--by Jesse Stone, whose other compositions included the landmark “Shake, Rattle and Roll”--were cartoonish enough in the ‘50s, but serve even better today to ridicule hedonistic, playboy attitudes. Sample lyric from the song that outlines a singer’s fantasies:

Ten Cadillacs, a diamond mill; Ten suits of clothes, to dress to kill

A 10-room house, some barbecue; And 500 chicks, not over 22.

Elsewhere, Johansen high-steps his way through the sly “Bad Boy,” a song co-written by Louis Armstrong, and then wades through the sorrows of romance outlined in the torchlike “Are You Lonely for Me, Baby.”

So what’s the problem?

While Johansen does a good job on individual numbers, the whole thing seems slight at the end--leaving the album as little more than a more sophisticated version of what John Belushi and Dan Akroyd did as the Blues Brothers. The album is never able to quite shake your suspicion that far more engaging--and liberating--samples of this music are available elsewhere.

And, sure enough, all you need to begin confirming that suspicion is turn to another recent album released by RCA: “The Blues and Rhythm Revue,” a two-record set, assembled by Gregg Geller, that spotlights various black music genres--jazz and blues to gospel and R&B--from; the ‘40s and ‘50s.

The richly varied material ranges from Lil Green’s coquettish “Romance in the Dark” and the Count Basie Orchestra’s offbeat “Did You See Jackie Robinson Hit That Ball?” to Little Richard’s bluesy, pre-”Tutti Frutti” recording of “Get Rich Quick” and the Isley Brothers’ jubilant “Shout!”

QUOTE OF THE WEEK--Asked in Rolling Stone about the current direction of music, Stevie Wonder had this to say about Prince, whose new concert movie has just opened here: “Prince has really been unique in the way he uses words. The lyrics on (his new album) are incredible. He’s like the Dylan of the ‘80s as far as what he is saying. Incredible lyrics. And the song, the melody, the music is good too.

“It’s kind of like Prince is an African storyteller, right? It seems like he’s passing on what is happening in this time and place that we’re living in right now. And he doesn’t say specifically: ‘Oh, this is horrible; this is wrong.’ Which you know is what he’s saying. He says: ‘Hey, let’s get married, have a baby, raise a family. Let’s do something. Let’s give hope for the future.’ ”

U2 TICKETS AND OTHER NEWS: Tickets for U2’s special, low price ($5) concerts Dec. 19 and 20 at Sun Devil Stadium in Tempe, Ariz., will go on sale in Southern California at 10 a.m. today at Ticketmaster outlets and charge phone lines (800-255-3424). Both concerts will be filmed in connection with the Irish rock band’s concert movie that is due next summer. . . . The candidate as pop star? Speeches by the Rev. Jesse Jackson are woven into both parts of the new Aretha Franklin gospel album and New York rap group Stetsasonic’s anti-apartheid single, “A.F.R.I.C.A.”. . . . Tonight’s scheduled performance by teen star Tiffany at the Palace has been canceled because the singer has the flu, according to a Palace spokesman. The show may be rescheduled for sometime next month.

LIVE ACTION: Barry Manilow’s Pantages Theatre engagement, which begins Dec. 25, has been extended four nights. Tickets for the Jan. 6-9 shows go on sale Monday. . . . Jerry Garcia’s Wiltern Theatre stand, which begins Dec. 3, has added an additional show on Dec. 6. Tickets go on sale Monday. . . . Dion will be joined by Donovan on Jan. 2 at the Universal Amphitheatre. Tickets go on sale Sunday.