Rufus Wainwright regains his style

Rufus Wainwright

“Want You” (DreamWorks)

****

This New Yorker seemed so obscenely ambitious and endlessly talented in his 1998 debut album that even a listless, undernourished follow-up three years later couldn’t shake your belief in him.

In that second album, “Poses,” Wainwright seemed so enamored with the romantic singer-songwriter lifestyle and so certain of his musical gifts that he forgot that an artist needs the discipline to apply that talent.

Wainwright, who spent a month in an addiction treatment center last year, answers the wake-up call in a frequently captivating CD that examines personal vices and virtues so openly that it’s a wonder it isn’t a self-indulgent mess.

There’s a beauty in everything, from the purity and deep longing of his soaring singing to the bright, enchanting arrangements. When is the last time you heard an album start with a spunky tuba solo?

From the beginning, Wainwright was a strange but intriguing blend of cabaret, Broadway show music and classic pop, and he now adds a touch of blues that helps blend the various influences into a more personalized and soulful sound.

The son of singer-songwriters Loudon Wainwright III and Kate McGarrigle, Wainwright often reflects on the connection between his restless lifestyle and his family roots. In “Oh What a World,” he asks, “Why I am always on a plane or a fast train? Oh what a world my parents gave me/ Always traveling, but not in love.”

So it’s all the more touching 13 songs later, in “Dinner at Eight,” when the 30-year-old sits down with his father for a reconciliation of sorts that speaks to fathers and sons everywhere with heart-tugging results.

Wainwright is apparently on such a creative run that “Want You” was originally going to be a two-disc album. The second half, tentatively titled “Want Two,” won’t be released until next year.

Robert Hilburn

*

Out from behind the veil

Beth Gibbons and Rustin Man

“Out of Season” (Sanctuary)

****

In Portishead, Gibbons was a vocal talent second perhaps only to Bjork and Sinead O’Connor in groundbreaking ‘90s pop, evoking at turns Billie Holiday, Shirley Bassey and Julie London.

But she hid behind the group’s noir, trip-hop production, face-shielding red hair and a haze of cigarette smoke, shyly refusing to give interviews and revealing nothing of herself but that stunning voice.

Does her new teaming with Rustin Man (a.k.a. Paul Webb, formerly of Talk Talk) remove the veil? Yes and no. Gone are the sample-heavy atmospheres, replaced in “Out of Season” (in stores Tuesday) by more organic support and songwriting, imaginatively drawing on folk, jazz, torch ballad and classic-pop models that allow Gibbons to show an even greater range of skills and emotions.

The fittingly titled opening track, “Mysteries,” is a paean to loneliness that updates the kind of art-folk song Judy Collins perfected in the ‘60s and Nick Drake (explicitly echoed in the song “Drake”) personalized in the ‘70s. “Tom the Model” is the showstopper, as Gibbons reaches down in her register for a heartbroken send-off, while lush, soul-pop strings swell around her.

She revisits her overly mannered Holiday imitation in “Romance,” but on the whole she’s never sounded more natural, complemented exquisitely by environments sculpted by Webb and Portishead co-principal Adrian Utley that at times recall the somber sides of Nelson Riddle or Burt Bacharach.

If the old veil is gone, arguably new ones have been added, but in more suitable shades and styles, creating both alluring mystery and engaging mystique. Gibbons and Rustin Man play the Avalon on Oct. 26.

-- Steve Hochman

‘Cheers’ debut a bland welcome

Obie Trice

“Cheers” (Shady/Interscope)

**

This Eminem protege may want to go where everybody knows his name, but his debut album doesn’t help the cause. Unlike his lively mentor, whose animated delivery and strong song concepts have made him one of rap’s most compelling artists, Trice’s monotone rapping and bland lyrics sap much of the energy from some of the album’s stronger beats.

In fact, Trice’s collaborators routinely deliver performances more captivating than this. On the confrontational “S*** Hits the Fan,” for example, Dr. Dre raps with muscular menace over a deliberate, thumping piano backdrop, while on the sinister “We All Die One Day” Eminem spits his spectacular brand of venom over a dark soundscape. Their sense of purpose and energy only highlights Trice’s mediocrity.

Trice tries his hand at introspection on “Never Forget Ya,” but for an artist who has yet to prove himself, his claims of making hits sound strange. In a land of musical giants, Obie Trice needs to stand taller to make a mark like that of his comrades.

-- Soren Baker

Fred Durst shows his softer side

Limp Bizkit

“Results May Vary” (Flip/Interscope)

** 1/2

Fred Durst remains a self-aggrandizing knucklehead: Fearless, clumsy, incredibly clever and equally dumb, hero and villain, the star of his own epic movie. But he also wants to be more than the leader of a dumb rock band, so he’s applied a lighter touch on Limp Bizkit’s fourth album, exploring new emotional territory and at one point even muttering, “Most men don’t cry enough . I cry myself to sleep.”

He is searching here, making his first Bizkit album without key collaborator and guitarist Wes Borland. The cover art still may show Durst as fun-loving brute, but the music achieves some surprising sophistication with new textures both acoustic and electronic. Durst also is not so obnoxious nearly so often; at the same time, his songs too often lack the harsh melodic spark that once turned his ravings into pop hits.

Bizkit drifts into hard-rock glam on “Underneath the Gun,” sounding for a moment like Jane’s Addiction. And the singer trades raps with Snoop Dogg on “Red Light -- Green Light,” their vocals set against a slippery click-clack groove. Durst finally lands in the groove during the deep metal sludge of “The Only One,” in which he talks of not wanting sex on a first date.

Just a kiss “‘till I think you deserve me.” Be gentle.

-- Steve Appleford