*** Jon Spencer Blues Explosion

ACME

(Matador/Capitol)

For about 15 minutes, ACME had me convinced that Jon Spencer, mixed-up master of the jackknife punk-blues deconstruction, had finally gotten his act together. After all these years of mimicking bad garage bands who were aping the Stones, he tackles the Stones head on with "Magical Colors" -- such a remarkable impersonation of Some Girls-era Mick and Keef that it pretty much shows up the rest of the album as an elaborate evasion of Spencer's natural talents.

Ah, but the fractured aesthetic favored by the ol' JSBX demands that the whole self-consciously deliver less than the sum of its parts, and once they get around to greasing up the sampler, the results are a characteristically mixed bag. Spencer has already done more than anyone save Beck to prove that flat-out rock and roll can adapt to the editing techniques of hip-hop, a cause furthered by the pomo doo-wop of "Do You Wanna Get Heavy?" and hindered by their messy infomercial "Talk About the Blues." In places where the band can't manufacture enough mistakes on their own, they bring in Dan "The Automator" Nakamura and Atari Teenage Riot's Alex Empire to scramble their eggs for 'em. But in terms of guiding spirits, the presence of turntablists is less prominent than that of '50s R&B novelty-hit genius Andre Williams, who appears in shouted references to his songs ("The Greasy Chicken," "Bacon Fat").

-- Carly Carioli