CD report

A GIRL LIKE ME
Def Jam
Give this teenage singer some credit: She clearly has a knack for fluffernutter bonbons that make great radio singles. On her second record in a less than a year, the Bahamas-born artist has followed her smash hit ''Pon De Replay" with the equally delightful ''SOS," which bites Soft Cell's ''Tainted Love" and rivals Ne-Yo's ''So Sick" as this year's most infectious song. The comparison is apt because Ne-Yo helps out here, writing the big power ballad ''Unfaithful," which finds Rihanna reaching for her gun and her producer reaching for the heavens with a mix of strings and lilting keyboards. Not everything here is as smartly executed. But she does take a stab at broadening her sound on the tougher ''Kisses Don't Lie" or the percolating ''Selfish Girl," both of which feature Rihanna's kittenish vocals. She doesn't have a powerhouse voice but she knows what the songs need and delivers. Various producers serve her well by giving Rihanna plenty of space. The vocalist shines brightest when she nods to her Caribbean roots on the flavorful ''Break It Off," featuring the typically kinetic Sean Paul, or ''Dem Haters," which shows some spirit and fire. A bit more in this vein of would make the set less predictable and more intriguing. Rihanna still has some growing to do. This album could use greater focus and more songs with depth, but there's still a lot like about ''Girl." ESSENTIAL TRACK: ''SOS."
KEN CAPOBIANCO
SAMPLE RIHANNA Check out audio clips at www.boston.com/clips.

PEOPLE THAT I'M WRONG FORDualtoneIn the 17 years since he left the Del Fuegos, Warren Zanes assembled a series of potentially pop-killing credentials. He earned a PhD, wrote a book on Dusty Springfield, and landed a job as veep of education at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. But instead of sucking the soul out of his music, the resume-building gave Zanes time to turn himself into a composer. He's 40 now, no longer the baby-face bar band guitarist whose previous singing experience was limited to barked-out gang vocals. Zanes proved he could craft serious music on his first solo album, 2003's ''Memory Girls." ''People That I'm Wrong For" takes the same approach without copying his debut. It's essentially a pop album, with a cloud hanging over as Zanes chronicles love in various stages of disarray. Zanes and producer Daniel Tashian dress up his voice, soft and sometimes gravelly, with multitracked harmonies and chewy hooks. The musical flourishes -- a twangy pedal steel on ''Fool the Moon," Stax-styled horns on ''Jr's Bag of Tricks" -- add texture without losing the album's unified feel. And even though Zanes is smart enough to drop references like an overstaffed temp agency, he understands that he's better off singing his own tune. ESSENTIAL TRACK: ''Things Nobody's Named Yet." Warren Zanes plays at Lizard Lounge on May 13.
GEOFF EDGERS

A BLESSING AND A CURSE
New West
Eschewing the Southern pride and rock historicism of such earlier albums as ''Southern Rock Opera," the seventh album from the Drive-By Truckers hews closely to the pattern of 2003's underrated ''Decoration Day": lovelorn, clear-eyed ballads and dirges with acoustic-guitar strumming lay atop a bedrock foundation of pedal-steel picking. A country band performing for a rock audience, the Truckers provide a frisson of howdy-y'all roots authenticity to an audience weaned on electric-guitar bombast. The result is Americana without the boogie, and without the Allmans solos -- closer, in fact, to a raucous Uncle Tupelo than anything else. The bulk of ''A Blessing and a Curse" is cursed by a certain sameness; one of the best things about earlier efforts was the varied palette, helped along by the distinct contributions of songwriters Patterson Hood, Jason Isbell, and Mike Cooley. While all three contribute songs here, their efforts lack the immediacy of earlier Truckers tunes such as ''My Sweet Annette," ''Hell No I Ain't Happy," and ''Days of Graduation." Things pick up only with the album's final two songs, the bruising title track, which winds its way around a snaky repeating guitar figure, and the hard-fought wisdom of ''A World of Hurt." The results here, while still enjoyable, are a bit halfhearted, and a distinct step down from ''Decoration" and ''Southern Rock Opera." Still, even at less than their best, the Drive-By Truckers are among the most literate bands around, and ''A Blessing and a Curse" is an album from one of the rare performers who make you want to follow along with a lyric sheet while listening. ESSENTIAL TRACK: ''A World of Hurt."
SAUL AUSTERLITZ

THE HARDEST WAY TO MAKE AN EASY LIVING
Vice/Atlantic
When last we saw Mike Skinner on an album cover, he was leaning against a weathered bus shelter; on his new CD, he's leaning against a black Rolls-Royce. Ah yes, the bloke of 2004's brilliant ''A Grand Don't Come for Free," is no longer broke, and therein lies the niggling problem with Skinner's latest offering. Three albums into his career, the British rapper/producer is flush with cash and discontent. Gone is the hard-luck slacker who once got all dreamy-eyed watching a woman twirling her hair, and fretted getting hit with a late fee for an overdue video. These days Skinner is more concerned with his Saville Row suits, and the difficulties in getting high in the presence of camera-phone-packing strangers, as he bemoans on ''When You Wasn't Famous." It's certainly a catchy song, and one might even chuckle at Skinner's dilemma -- he now has access to famous women, unless they're more famous than he is. Yet it's the lament of a self-involved lout trying to wring sympathy from the traumas of being rich and famous. If only he had crafted more tracks like the standout ''Never Went to Church," a deeply affecting song about Skinner's emotional undertow following his father's death. It's the one promising sign here that Skinner can move beyond this tedious mo' money-mo' problems phase, and again get back to making albums that are inventive instead of tiresome. ESSENTIAL TRACK: ''Never Went to Church."
RENÉE GRAHAM

GOODBYE ALICE IN WONDERLAND
Atlantic
After the her failed attempt at irony on 2003's dance-pop laden ''0304," Jewel has returned to her folk-pop beginnings on ''Goodbye Alice in Wonderland." Straightforward songwriting combined with elegant production by Rob Cavallo (Green Day) make her sixth album sparkle at times, but never fully shine. The verses of opener ''Again and Again" carry a whiff of capriciousness like an old Ani DiFranco song, but Jewel's voice can't fill out the glossy chorus. When her vocals do reach a bombastic wail, it's lost amid the dim-witted Los Angeles commentary in the lyrics of ''Satellite" (e.g., ''Miss Cleo can't fix my broken heart." At times, lyrics are confessional to the point of cliche. Tunes like ''Good Day" and ''Stephenville, TX" sound more like alternate takes on Anna Nalick's ''Breathe (2 AM)." Jewel's at her best when the intensity drops and she can sing out a ballad. On ''Alice" we have ''Last Dance Rodeo" and ''1000 Miles Away," which both carry the same passion of her older work (''Foolish Games," ''You Were Meant for Me"). Less successful is the title track with the lines: ''I'm embarrassed to say the rest is rock 'n' roll cliche/ I hit the bottom when I reached the top." Jewel's returned from the rabbit hole with a decent pop offering, but it's too polished to be as real as she wants it to be. ESSENTIAL TRACK: ''Again and Again."
BOBBY HANKINSON