Off MOR’s Beaten Path With Camper van Beethoven : CAMPER VAN BEETHOVEN “Key Lime Pie.” Virgin ***: POP STARS: ***** Great Balls of Fire: ***** Knockin’ on Heaven’s: *** Good Vibrations: ** Maybe Baby: * Ain’t That a Shame

“I’m alternating between heavy and light, between meaning and nonsense and having a drink,” sings lead Camper David Lowery in one song on the Santa Cruz group’s fifth album. The best Camper tunes have generally been at one extreme or the other, as on the 1985 debut, “Telephone Free Landslide Victory,” which slid back and forth between rough-hewn, Turkish-style instrumentals and goofy post-punk snottyisms like “Take the Skinheads Bowling.”

On their second big-label album, the Campers drive pretty much down the middle of their road--though it’s still a trek off the beaten path. Within that context, Lowery becomes an acute observer of American quirks, and the band, with a helping hand from producer Dennis Herring, manages to be both arty and earthy, sketchy and complex.

But as the material becomes more sophisticated, Lowery’s wise-guy whine seems more and more inadequate. On the other hand, could a “real” singer possibly convey either the strange nostalgia of “Sweethearts” or the bleary ramble of the above-quoted “The Light From the Cake” that is so essential to whatever it is that CVB does so well