Gray too inconsistent for her own good

Macy Gray has been by far the most interesting female voice in the neo-soul movement. She is able to surpass contemporaries Jill Scott, Lauryn Hill, the loathsome Alicia Keys or Erykah Badu with sheer freakiness. Gray is an awkward woman who Jim DeRogatis once described as Betty Boop after too many bong rips. Her main asset is that her voice, a kind of smoky scratch, is quite an original instrument and is put to good work with a gift for diction and alliteration similar to Bob Dylan.\nGray came to us via the superb single "I Try" from her debut album On How Life Is. The album was full of FM fodder, but Gray's irregularities couldn't be contained and the follow-up, 2001's The Id, was hypersexual, drugged out and much less of a family affair. Devoid of the ballads that bring her type success, The Id was a bit of a disappointment commercially and critically (at least to the Entertainment Weekly types who got worked up about "I Try").\nThe Trouble With Being Myself mines similar territory to The Id, combining Gray's brazen personality with her love of '70s R&B, but exists in more humane realities. Gray manipulates Stax-like brass sections and organ, Jackson 5 guitar riffs and string sections (arranged by Beck's dad, David Campbell) in making a particularly old school record, spiced in an overly tasteful fashion with modern hip-hop production. \nDespite some coasting moments, The Trouble With Being Myself manages to hit the highs of her previous albums with its singles. Two of the sweeping ballads, "She Ain't Right For You" and "She Don't Write Songs About You," hit their intended emotional strings and the sing-a-long choruses of the uptempo, feel-good "Screamin'" and "When I See You" follow the schemes of VH1 and adult-contemporary chart success.\nPerhaps relying completely on her own songwriting is a bit of a mistake for Gray, as she fails to capture the self-evident feeling in her voice. Confessional songs like "My Fondest Childhood Memories," in which she describes catching her mother making love to the plumber and her father with the babysitter, and "Happiness," where she sings about her taste for drugs, are musically played as jokes and confine any affective meaning. \nIt's not that The Trouble With Being Myself is wrought with formalities of R&B, because it is manifest that Gray is a complicated character. The album is full of caution, though, and Gray should be unleashed on a delicate synthesis of the right material and a good amount of creative freedom.