** Graham Coxon

THE SKY IS TOO HIGH

(Transcopic)

When John Frusciante went AWOL from the Red Hot Chili Peppers, he put out the impenetrable and agonizing Niandra Lades, a troubling collection of barely finished abstracts that suggested Syd Barrett's post-Floyd collapse. Graham Coxon is still in Blur, but his first solo album reflects a similar joy/frustration/breakdown. Basement-studio in sound, sullen, even contrite, in attitude, it approaches Dinosaur Jr's ragged glory on indie storms like "That's All I Wanna Do" but for the most part sticks to acoustic, in-the-living-room melancholy ("Where'd You Go," "In a Salty Sea," and "A Day Is Far Too Long," a pretty, ravaged heartbreak song with lithe harmonies). Coxon has pointed out that Sky was produced in a spell of "teetotalism," a respite from Blur's pub lust and frequent skiing expeditions. As such, it's a tuneful document of one man's obsessions, painted with Coxon's estimable guitar smarts and as navel-gazing as it gets.

-- James Rotondi