*** Counting Crows

THIS DESERT LIFE

(DGC/Interscope)

In Counting Crows' 1993 breakthrough single, "Mr. Jones," singer Adam Duritz came right out and admitted that he wanted to be a star, or at least Bob Dylan. So it was a little hard to take the joyless and morose manner in which he greeted the onset of stardom on the Crows' sophomore disc, 1996's Recovering the Satellites, particularly given the disc's rather expansive- (i.e., expensive-) sounding production values.

But Duritz goes a long way toward redeeming himself in the new "Mrs. Potter's Lullaby," a loose, Dylanesque collection of verses that begins with an admission -- "I am an idiot walking a tightrope of fortune and fame" -- and goes on to coax a certain amount of pleasure from whatever pain it is that's kept him from enjoying his good fortune. The band, who still sound as if they'd like nothing more than to be the Band of the Basement Tapes era, seem to have loosened up again, and the arrangements on This Desert Life (in stores this Tuesday) feel less claustrophobic. And if Duritz's penchant for drawing inspiration almost exclusively from his darker moods hasn't abated ("If I could make it rain today/And wash away this sunny day down to the gutter/I would," he assures us in the piano-based ballad "Amy Hit the Atmosphere"), he at least seems to recognize that he enjoys being tangled up in blue.

-- Matt Ashare

(Counting Crows perform this Sunday, October 31, at the Orpheum with Gigolo Aunts and Joe 90. Call 423-NEXT.)