Tracy Nelson's Sweet Soul Music is a sadly predictable failure. Once this was the kind of title which would have exactly described her music. A classic blues and gospel singer, she once put her songs across with a genuine ache, not just a posture and a shriek.

But the years haven't been kind to Tracy Nelson. Or perhaps it is more that she has not been kind to herself or her talent. Drifting aimlessly from label to label, she never quite put together not just the big hit but the proper forum in which to present her music. She has seemed uncomfortable with all but the most mediocre musicians and has seen successive Mother Earths degenerate until they no longer share in the billing or play on her records.

The new album shows the sad result of this long decline. Gone is the crisp definition of the blues and pure gospel music on which she seemed to thrive. In its place are dull rhythms and mechanical changes mechanically spelled out, which the singer's voice only listlessly follows. Gone is the voice which could erotically echo Mavis Staples's contralto register. In its place is a ponderous instrument of unvarying timbre which can only bellow when aroused. Gone is the sure sense of what she wanted to do. Instead we get inanities like the title song or the insensitive atrocity which is visited on Bob Dylan's "I'll Be Your Baby Tonight."

It's not as if there were no glimmers of the old talent. On a song like "Nothing I Can't Handle"—a rare Tracy Nelson composition, loosely structured, long-suffering, gospel sounding—we hear echoes of her aching "Down So Low." On Don Nix's "Same Old Blues" you catch a glimpse of her shattering treatment of Little Willie John's "Need Your Love So Bad."

But there is none of the transcendence of the earlier works. She doesn't get through the blues; she sloughs around in them. There is no lightness. There is no leavening touch.

Perhaps it's just a matter of finding the right producer, someone who will bring out the music in Tracy Nelson. From seeing her over the years, though, what seems to me more to the point is the attitude which Tracy Nelson takes toward both herself and her art. Always Tracy Nelson seems to be saying, look at the indignities foisted on me: this shitty company, this shitty sound system, this unappreciative crowd, this bad sore throat. You wish sometimes that she could only stop pitying herself and realize that, like Mavis Staples or Irma Thomas, who have after all been at it a lot longer than she has and under considerably more difficult conditions, she is in the business of entertainment. She is not just another gifted amateur who has been thrust up on the stage; she is by choice a professional. There is no magic to this realization. Until she comes to it, though, Tracy Nelson is likely to continue to put out albums like this one. (RS 202)

PETER GURALNICK