*** Barry Adamson

AS ABOVE SO BELOW

(Mute)

To hell with empire building. With a few deft turns of arrangement and studio mastery, former Magazine and Nick Cave bassist turned rock composer Barry Adamson can create whole universes built around his whims of interest. His past solo recordings (The Negro Inside Me, Oedipus Schmoedipus) have mostly explored issues of identity. Here he adds God and the Devil, morality and sex, to the mix. And what a mix it is! Lounge jazz tangos with electronica. The rumble and hum of industrial rock purr up to sweet acoustic/electric textures. Big beats ease into transcendent melodies. But at the center of it all beats a dark little heart full of Adamson's witty, cynical observations and his natural inclination to use shades of black as his primary musical colors. On tunes like "Jazz Devil," his smooth-guy intonations come off as a '90s update of Ken Nordine's "word jazz" hipsterism. Those who paid attention to Adamson's soundtrack work for David Lynch's Lost Highway will know the score. Otherwise, this album's a vivid introduction to an inventive rock auteur.

-- Ted Drozdowski