ANOTHER ODD COUPLE

Producer Rick Rubin’s parade of surprising collaborations just marches on. But on the heels of projects with Johnny Cash and Donovan, the American Recordings owner has gone even further afield, making a deal to produce and release new records by Pakistani singer Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan.

Khan, whose soaring vocal lines were featured in the music for the movie “Dead Man Walking” (including two duets with Eddie Vedder), will open the new deal with an album of traditional Qawwali devotional music, due in September. Rubin will then produce two new albums, the first traditional and the second matching Khan with Western singers yet to be determined. Rubin is also planning to collect some of Khan’s many Pakistani recordings into a series of box set anthologies, and the prolific singer will continue to record at least one album a year for Peter Gabriel’s Real World label.