**1/2 Chuck E. Weiss

EXTREMELY COOL

(Slow River/Rykodisc)

This is just Weiss's second album, the first one being an obscurity released 18 years ago, and though the guy's connected -- he was immortalized by Rickie Lee Jones's "Chuck E.'s in Love" back in '79 and is a long-time pal of Tom Waits, who produced and co-wrote and appears on two tracks here -- the question isn't so much what took so long (his choice) as it is why now? Possibly because Weiss is a natural-born archivist, and some aspects of his obsessions have come into vogue recently. So much so that the disc's title cut, which might have sounded freshly quaint 15 years ago, plays like yet another hepcat '40s-revival move.

But Chuck E.'s for real, and his range goes from Bubber Miley-era Duke to Cajun to retro-rock to nasty-sounding blues. The best bits, or the strangest anyway, are the incantatory nonsense songs like "Pygmy Fund" and "Do You Know What I Idi Amin," the latter with Waits and with the goofiness quotient hitting the delirium level. Unlike Waits's stuff, though, Weiss's doesn't stick to the ribs. It's not so much extremely cool as extremely off-the-cuff (same difference?), fun but rarely inspired.

-- Richard C. Walls