Let's face it, most artists who were daubed with genius' murky brushstrokes twenty years ago have either died and become legends, or made progressively worse records and become embarrassments.
Rickie Lee Jones, however, has done neither. Instead of foolishly trying to recapture the early beret-wearing folk days of 'Chuck E's In Love' and 'We Belong Together' she's taken her guitar and that yearning, barefoot bohemian voice and made forays into synth music and dance and bought a house in the land of jazz.
Perhaps now, though, she's preparing to be an embarrassment (to under forty year olds who don't like Broadway shows anyway) as she's done a cover versions album of 'classic' songs - which usually means hackneyed bore fests.
There's the excruciatingly shmaltzy, overly-earnest 'One Hand One Heart', from (yikes!) West Side Story, which just screams Barbara Dickson, a tired version of the terrible 'Smile' (y'know the one, 'Smile though your heart is breaking'), and, oh please no, 'Someone To Watch Over Me'.
But there's also a syncopated jazz version of 'On the Street Where You Live' which is cool enough to get even twenty year olds heading down Ronnie Scott's.
And fortunately, Rickie also goes beyond the cliched songbook, choosing songs which the soaring yet contemplative voice lends itself perfectly to, and makes her own - we have an impassioned 'For No One' by the Beatles, a lovely 'Cycles', (which Frank Sinatra used to sing), and Steely Dan's spirited 'Show Biz Kids' which she could almost have written.
Embarrassment is witheld, for now.
