While U2 was off discovering America, Mike Scott and crew relocated from Glasgow to Dublin to draw inspiration from Irish character and culture. The first sound on the Waterboys' fourth album is a spirited fiddle; the first sound to escape Mike Scott's mouth a life-filled whoop; the last song a gently moving reading of the Irish poet W.B. Yeats's "Stolen Child," featuring passages spoken by Tomás McKeown, a Galway-bred traditional singer.

Those three elements pretty well define the record, as Scott's remarkable ease and agility with both melody and phrase show tremendous maturation since 1986's This Is the Sea – an impressively ambitious and mature work in itself. Scott has forged a folkier sound than he has used before, a sound that is at once simpler and more accomplished and varied than what had sometimes seemed, in the past, an overwhelming, if not overblown, approach.

Using a cast of more than a dozen musicians, Scott has crafted a variety of settings, from spirited folk ("When Will We Be Married?") to thundering rock ("World Party," a nod to former Waterboy Karl Wallinger). Scott even throws in a credible version of Van Morrison's "Sweet Thing," throaty growls and all.

The Waterboys' sound may no longer be as massive as their ambitions, but the effect is at least as stunning and seductive. (RS 543)

STEVE HOCHMAN