Mark Lanegan’s Voice Raw, Direct as Solo Artist

Mark Lanegan isn’t interested in your good time. He doesn’t tell jokes or try to find out which section of his audience can cheer the loudest. And he smashes no guitars. Lanegan broods.

At the Knitting Factory on Saturday, Lanegan hardly moved at all, leaning hard against his microphone stand, his face perpetually in shadow. But this was enough for him, setting his weathered voice against the frayed elegance of his four-piece band, including two guitarists who mingled Crazy Horse-like thunderbolts on the song “One Way Street.”

Rock stardom isn’t everyone’s dream job. And like others of the ‘90s indie-rock generation, Lanegan always seemed uncomfortable with the mainstream success he briefly endured with the Screaming Trees (“Nearly Lost You”). The spotlight finally moved on, but while Lanegan still has the will to rock (he recently became an official member of the Queens of the Stone Age), he has also thrived as a solo artist, landing at his own post-punk version of John Lee Hooker’s madman blues.

His just-released fifth solo album, “Field Songs,” is his first since the final breakup of the Screaming Trees last year. The music is raw and direct, quietly confident with a blend of understatement, ragged guitar work and the singer’s ruined growl.

That spell was unbroken at the Knitting Factory. He said virtually nothing to fans between songs but found meaningful expression with a troubled voice that sounded like something burnt from far too many cigarettes. The music was not unlike sounds already explored by the likes of Nick Cave and the Gun Club, but it fit Lanegan far better than pop radio and MTV ever did.