POP/ROCK

NERD, "Seeing Sounds"

(Star Trak/Interscope)

There are no drums better than the Neptunes' drums. Crisp, authoritative and crackling, they have laid the bedrock for many of the most electrifying rap songs of the past decade. And even though it has been a few years since the duo -- Pharrell Williams and Chad Hugo -- has had a stranglehold on urban radio, those who have followed the pair have failed to improve on its foundation.

The drums, refreshingly, are in glorious form on "Seeing Sounds," the third album from the Neptunes' rock side-project, NERD, which includes the rapper Shay Haley. It's Williams, though, who really has rock-star aspirations. Although he lacks range and depth, he's a supremely cocky vocalist. And charm, in his case, suffices.

NERD's 2002 debut album, "In Search Of," was an almost unqualified success; still young, NERD had winning naivete and passion, and Williams' emotions felt genuine. The 2004 follow-up, "Fly or Die," felt more confident and controlled, and the album suffered for it.

Happily, there are moments of successful vulnerability here. On the breezy, jazz-inflected "Yeah You," about a one-night stand turned unbalanced stalker, Williams delights in the chase -- and the escape. And throughout the album, he is in vivid form. He's a cynical seducer on "You Know What" and a paranoid hippie on "Love Bomb."

But while "Seeing Sounds" is a triumph of will, it is not quite a triumph. In many places the music can't keep up with Williams' effervescence. Songs shift abruptly midway; "Everyone Nose (All the Girls Standing in the Line for the Bathroom)" moves inexplicably from a raucous Miami bass chant to pensive Barry Manilow-esque piano. "Sooner or Later" is sweet, but it sounds as if it were lifted from the middling English soft-rock band Keane. (NERD has a fetish with things British.) And worse, it ends with an indulgent, grating, nearly three-minute jam.

But my, those drums. They're like miniature explosions on "Anti Matter." And "Spaz" is a masterwork, with punishing rhythms plucked straight from the drum 'n' bass of mid-'90s London. They are overpowering enough to distract from the fact that Williams is singing, essentially, about nothing.

NERD performs Wednesday at Target Center with Kanye West.

JON CARAMANICA, NEW YORK TIMES

Alanis Morissette,

"Flavors of Entanglement" (Warner Bros.)

When she sings a blue streak, it makes me feel all bleepin' warm inside.

This -- her first album of new material in four years -- isn't the best Morissette album. With its Mideast swirls, trip-hop beats and oft-turgid self-analysis, it can play like a parody. But there are spots of remarkable revelation, including the spellbinding breakup song "Not As We."

SEAN DALY, ST. PETERSBURG TIMES