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Believe it or not, Mad Season face some stiff odds. On one hand, they're a Seattle supergroup. On the other, they're a Seattle supergroup. They could rest on the laurels of their lineup – Alice in Chains singer Layne Staley, Pearl Jam lead guitarist Mike McCready and Screaming Trees drummer Barrett Martin, with newcomer John Baker Saunders on bass – or their collaboration could make a nice, fat target for naysayers. Mad Season may not have the special chemistry that makes their respective groups so successful, but they do have presence, and more importantly, they take artistic risks and set out to make something fresh on Above.

Sometimes, Mad Season slip up, indulging opaque lyrics into which fans might read Seattle-related meanings ("Rich and growing sicker/Sell the dead ones quicker" goes a line in "X-Ray Mind"). Meanwhile, "Artificial Red" might have been more aptly titled "Artificial Blues," and the arena-rock pomp and stilted rhymes of "Lifeless Dead" highlight the album's hit-or-miss quality. Cut from the album's final version was a much-needed palate cleanser in the form of a soothing – if brief – acoustic interlude.

When they plunge into the two-ton metal groove of "I Don't Know Anything," the over-the-top country-rock angst of "River of Deceit" ("My pain is self-chosen," sings Staley) or the eerie cryptojazz of "Wake Up," Mad Season coalesce into something promising. In a particular trio of tunes – "November Hotel," "All Alone" and "Long Gone Day" – they kindle their creative sparks into music that gives off real heat. The lengthy instrumental jam "November Hotel" allows McCready, Martin and Saunders the chance to stretch out, providing an energetic high point as well as a canvas for McCready's riffs and ravings. And in "All Alone," Staley lets his voice become the song's focus, crystalline and strong, backed by a tensile, almost sitarlike drone.

Perhaps the last word on Mad Season, though, comes in "Long Gone Day," a lustrous duet in which Staley trades verses with Screaming Trees vocalist Mark Lanegan, whose honeyed growl is in its element among the cool percussion, sensitive sax and pliant bass. That Mad Season are capable of tremendous power and also succeed with such a subtle song proves that the band is – at times – more than the mere sum of its parts. (RS 706)

BARBARA DAVIES