‘Anywhere I Lay My Head’

‘Anywhere I Lay My Head’

Scarlett Johansson (Rhino)

Grade: C

The idea of Scarlett Johansson making a reputable album of Tom Waits covers isn’t as farfetched as it might seem. Before making dubious acting career moves such as “The Island,” ScarJo had hipster movie roles in “Ghost World” and “Lost In Translation,” and woke Woody Allen up creatively with “Match Point.” So with “Anywhere I Lay My Head,” Ryan Reynolds’ intended aims to re-establish her artsy bona fides. She digs into the oeuvre of guttural-voiced bohemian street poet Waits, and hooks up with Dave Sitek of art-rockers TV on the Radio, who produces, and brings in the Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ Nick Zinner, plus some guy named David Bowie.

Sitek surrounds Johansson with fuzzy layers of sounds, in a production style he’s described as “Tinker Bell on cough syrup.” The result is an intriguing vanity production with a hollow echo at the core. The problem is that Johansson’s impersonal voice never sounds the slightest bit relaxed, and is often unsteady. She has great difficulty carrying lugubriously paced tunes — like “Fannin’ Street” and “Fallin’ Down.” As musical debuts from crush-worthy actresses go, this will inevitably be unfavorably compared to Zooey Deschanel’s charming collaboration with M. Ward as She & Him, and that’s more than fair.

—Dan DeLuca, Philadelphia Inquirer

‘Home Before Dark’

Neil Diamond (Columbia)

Grade: C+

You can strip your arrangements of the schmaltzy excess of their recent past. You can get producer Rick Rubin to silence the drums and hire quirky studio cats to open your songs’ spacious skies. You can play guitar to bring urgency to your writing. But can you keep away from the hamminess, Neil Diamond? Can you get closer to the spooky “Solitary Man” of your past and not “Forever in Blue Jeans?”

Yes and no.

The grit in his baritone voice, the loss in the lyric, and the swagger in the melody of “Forgotten” is tense and rocking — pure, vintage Diamond, at once coolly confident and epically torn down. Diamond’s musky duet with Dixie Chick Natalie Maines on “Another Day [That Time Forgot]” is as elegiac a love song as Neil has penned, lyrically and musically. “If I Don’t See You Again” is graceful, boozy and icily conversational — an accomplishment within the Diamond canon. But there are dumbo paeans to the muse of songwriting and loopy tunes lifted to divine providence (“One More Bite of the Apple,” “Pretty Amazing Grace”), so saccharine they make the teeth hurt.

Whether great or ghoulish, Diamond’s crafting songs for no one but himself. That’s worth the ride home.

—A.D. Amorosi, Philadelphia Inquirer

‘Gavin DeGraw’

Gavin DeGraw (J Records)

Grade: B

Five years after “I Don’t Want To Be” helped his homespun, piano-driven pop-rock debut album “Chariot” reach platinum status, Gavin DeGraw is back with a slightly edgier but less consistent follow-up. Going for a more straightforward rock sound, DeGraw displays plenty of prowess as a pianist, guitarist, and writer of infectious, radio-friendly melodies. The album’s first single, “In Love With A Girl” is one of those perfect, roll-down-the-windows summer songs, while the tender “Let It Go” proves DeGraw a worthy romantic balladeer. But his keen musicality and distinctively soulful vocals can’t completely overcome the overabundance of wordy rhymes and nonsensical lyrics that show up on songs like the guitar-and-piano fueled “Medicate the Kids,” a cringe-worthy rant against ADD meds, or “Cop Stop,” in which he earnestly promises a potential love interest that he won’t, uh, treat her “like a rental car.”

—Nicole Pensiero, Philadelphia Inquirer

‘From The Reach’

Sonny Landreth (Landfall Records)

Grade: A

Sonny Landreth’s record sales have always been modest — until now, at least. But the reputation of the New Orleans guitar wiz is so lofty that when he decided to put together a duets album, the guest list included Eric Clapton and Mark Knopfler.

Also joining the fret party on “From The Reach” are Robben Ford, Eric Johnson and an underrated country picker named Vince Gill. Dr. John contributes a little Big Easy piano, and he and Jimmy Buffett sing harmony on one song.

The resulting music is hotter than a fresh batch of beignets. “From The Reach” succeeds in part because the guitarists don’t approach each break as if the one who plays the most notes wins. These solos sing and swing.

The project inspired some of Landreth’s best songwriting, and he tailors the material to fit his guests. For example, Knopfler is featured on the opening “Blue Tarp Blues,” which would be at home on any Dire Straits album.

Much of “Reach” rocks, but the best guitar work may be Landreth’s on the lovely ballad “Let It Fly.”

Other highlights include Clapton’s top-of-his-game playing on “When I Still Had You,” the funk-driven “Howlin’ Moon,” and the intricate interplay between Landreth and Johnson on the instrumental “The Milky Way Home.”

—Steven Wine, Associated Press

‘departure’

Jesse McCartney (Hollywood)

Grade: B

Risk and pop music hardly ever go together. Why take a chance when there’s money to be made?

That’s what makes Jesse McCartney’s new album, “Departure” (Hollywood), so remarkable. The first single “Leavin’” is an irresistible smash, with the reggae-and- R&B tinges and the cell-phone bleeps making the big pop chorus that much more memorable. But that’s only the beginning of “Departure’s” wild ride.

Working with a who’s who of hot producers, McCartney zooms all over the musical map with reckless abandon, seemingly willing to try anything except the pretty “Beautiful Soul” pop that he was previously known for. Sometimes it works. Sean Garrett’s “How Do You Sleep?” is an update of those unstoppable boy band hits of a decade ago, while “Runnin’,” from up-and-comers The Clutch, gives McCartney a stylish R&B beat tailor-made for today’s radio playlists.

But even when it doesn’t quite work — in the crazy-eyed hip-hop of “Rock You” or the in-your-face R&B of “Freaky” — McCartney’s delivery and the slick production still keep it entertaining.

After co-writing Leona Lewis’ “Bleeding Love” and voicing Theodore in “Alvin and the Chipmunks” and its surprisingly popular soundtrack, McCartney has already had quite a big year behind the scenes. With “Departure,” McCartney shows that sometimes all these chances pay off.

—Glenn Gamboa, Newsday

‘Roll With You’

Eli ‘Paperboy’ Reed (Q Division)

Grade: A

A 24-year-old Boston-area native who served a musical apprenticeship of sorts in the Mississippi Delta, Eli “Paperboy” Reed is in a long line of current young singers adopting classic soul styles. Even his nickname is a throwback. Still, he manages to stand out. Read all about it:

Despite the many Stax-era echoes, nothing about the music on “Roll With You” feels secondhand. Right now, Reed sounds more authoritative on the punchy, uptempo stuff than on the ballads, which occasionally betray hints of his youth. But he still emerges as a charismatic, full-blooded personality (all the tunes are originals). His voice can build to an unbridled, Bobby Bland-like squall, but whether he’s being gruff and tough, laying on the sweet-soul charm, or playing the hurting lover, he mostly delivers with the focus and controlled intensity of a savvy veteran.

—Nick Cristiano, Philadelphia Inquirer