Pastiched to perfection

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Diana Krall

The Girl in the Other Room

Verve

Anyone who has ever done the lounge piano-vocal gig for 60 bucks and two free drinks knows that versatility has its rewards. If you can segue from trad-jazz to honky-tonk to show tunes, if you can spice it up with crowd-pleasing virtuosity, and throw in some Sinatra or Elton John along the way, the tip jar quickly fills with green. But unless you're Michael Feinstein or Diana Krall, this particular talent rarely translates into recording success.

Miss Krall, who releases her eighth album, "The Girl in the Other Room," on Tuesday, is a brilliant lounge pianist-vocalist fluent in countless styles; in full control of a voice, throaty yet crystalline; and already floating somewhere in the stratosphere of jazz-pop celebrity. Her seductive blond tresses and recent marriage to alternative-rock icon Elvis Costello, who collaborated on this album, also haven't hurt. But the question remains: Does she have anything original to say as a musician?

As perfectly polished a pastiche of the jazz idiom as it may be, "Girl" -- at least musically -- has all been done before.

Let's just say it at the outset. Her fans will love it. Jazz purists will hate it. Popularizers will trumpet the virtues of bringing in a new following for what's considered a dying art. Purists will say that the limits for new takes on standards are still elastic as ever, and there's no need to stretch them (just check out pianist Brad Mehldau's Bach-inspired rendition of "All the Things You Are.") Nonetheless, even if the purists won't find much original here, "The Girl in the Other Room" is a curious, and not totally unsuccessful, hybrid.

Marked by touching lyrics related to her mother's death from cancer, and her recent marriage to Mr. Costello, Miss Krall's two conflicting milestones gel in the closing track, "Departure Bay." All in one, it tenderly evokes her native British Columbia -- salt air, sawmills, tugboats, droning seaplanes; painful reminders/remainders of a mother lost ("Now her perfume's on the bathroom counter"); and the optimism of new love. ("We're skimming stones and exchanging rings.")

All the original lyrics on the album, written or co-written by Mr. Costello, could almost stand alone as poetry, and if therapeutic cleansing was the aim here, perhaps a written volume -- with or without any commercial appeal -- may have been the way to go. Nonetheless, lyrics here are not an afterthought, and that is to be commended.

The problem is that musically, "The Girl in the Other Room" feels like a lot of tasteful yet superfluous attic rummaging. There's some of Mose Allison's a-little-too-white clear diction, some soothing New Age chords, some Santana-esque Latino-light on a cover of Tom Waits' "Temptation," a Julie London vibe on a cover of Mr. Costello's "Almost Blue," some Chicago Blues, a smidgen of Bill Evans' muted flits, a bit of Pat Metheny-style fusion on the guitar, and just a lot of suave sky-terrace tickling.

"Girl" is, granted, a decent primer on the jazz vocabulary, but like many of today's popular set of neocrooners, Miss Krall is less artist than pop archaeologist channeling a pastiche of musty relics. All this would not matter much if the album hadn't been hyped as Miss Krall's novel break-away from covering standards. As it stands, however, the whole product feels like an artful easy-listening confection for first dates and commuters in dire need of stress reduction.

The sad thing is, a lot of human emotion seems invested in this album. Some tracks, such as "I'm Pulling Through," can even nicely haunt the late-night listener. Miss Krall, even if she has coyly played on her looks, does not seem like someone hellbent on cashing in. And maybe it's unfair to demand originality from performers in an age when everyone seems to be "sampling" the attic -- DJs, hip-hop artists, boy bands, the next young thing. And maybe it's dated to demand dark erotic hunger, or some tease of the fragile grasp that the greats had on their own existence. Not all jazz purists want their greats to die young. But they do want a sound that wows and cuts to the bone.

Miss Krall fails not because she is lily-white -- as the old jazz-purist canard might suggest -- but simply because her creative instincts, however well-intentioned and personal, are too tepid and timid to evoke a visceral response. Again, her fans will love it. (It was ranked No. 3 already at Amazon.com as this went to press.)

But if you're searching for a female vocalist who wails hurtfully and beautifully in a way that cuts to the bone, go get yourself some Eva Cassidy.

Stefan Sullivan, author of two previous books, has been a lounge pianist/vocalist.