Music: Love, Meshell style

SMeshell Ndegeocello began her career having her cake and eating it, too. Her 1993 debut album, "Plantation Lullabies," spun out a minor hit, "If That's Your Boyfriend (He Wasn't Last Night)," and was nominated for three Grammys. A year later, she was ubiquitous on radio and MTV with John Mellencamp on a version of Van Morrison's "Wild Night."

Just like that, this black, bisexual singer/songwriter with a shaved head was an artistic renegade with commercial cachet, ringing the cash registers while zinging the zeitgeist on race and gender issues.

Ndegeocello has always been a genuine iconoclast, the sort of often-romanticized yet too rarely found artist who fearlessly follows her muse. (Born Michelle Johnson in 1968, she changed her name to the Swahili phrase for "free like a bird" when she was a teen.) She spent years honing her subsequent recordings, which often had little in common with the one before.

Having helped launch the neo-soul movement with "Plantation Lullabies," she moved on to more ethereal, biblical-themed social critiques ("Peace Beyond Passion"), scorn-focused folk rock ("Bitter"), ambitiously stylized hip-hop ("Cookie: The Anthropological Mixtape") and sophisticated, straight-ahead jazz ("The Spirit Music Jamia: Dance of the Infidel").

On Sunday, she will bring a quartet to the Dakota Jazz Club, but her new album, "Devil's Halo," isn't jazz.

"I wanted to get back to doing music you can make with your hands," she said by phone from New York, contrasting the disc to her more polished studio work of recent years.

Her persona this time out is reminiscent of both the lithe, breathy apparitions of Sade and the plain-spoken panache of Joan Armatrading.

Married to a 'White Girl'

The album is laden with love songs, but, this being Ndegeocello, they contain as much anger, woe and insecurity as bliss, satisfaction and desire -- the opposite of the Hallmark Card ethos.

"I hate Hallmark Cards!" she said with a laugh. "And these reality shows, like Tila Tequila -- aren't we getting tired of fooling ourselves with these fantasies of love, the things that are unattainable? I like seeing the other aspects of love, the ones that may not seem so lovey-dovey."

That doesn't mean she can't simply tumble on occasion. Ndegeocello puts a sexy spin on "Love You Down," the mid-'80s soul-pop confection by Ready for the World. And on the pop song "White Girl," she seems awestruck at the reciprocity of affection taking place, even as she's diddling with race and gender stereotypes.

Asked why the song's cherished protagonist is reduced to a "White Girl" construction, Ndegeocello doesn't flinch: "Just existing can be a pretty political experience for me. Because when I started an interracial relationship, my so-called people were the ones who were hardest on me."

'My rationality kicked in'

As much as she subverts the status quo, there is a kindness and grace accompanying the unflinching honesty, a generosity of spirit that enriches her songs. There was a time, in rebellious response to a doctrinaire upbringing she defines as "super-Christian," when she converted to Islam. Now, citing the experience of 9/11 and the way the Muslim world often treats women and people who are gay, she's not afraid to say she's not so sure.

"I guess I consider myself an Islam agnostic heading toward atheism. I started to see the world through new eyes and I guess my rationality kicked in. To quote Thomas Jefferson, religion is an insult to god. I mean, someone out there made all these beautiful flowers and things. I hope I am getting to a place where I can die without fear that someone is going to punish me -- or reward me."