Somewhere along a western stretch of I-80, nestled near a lost highway, is a place where emotion meets detachment, a place where the ghost of Hank Sr. hitches a ride in Lou Reed's Studs Bearcat, a place that Mazzy Star and Cowboy Junkies like to call home. The locals better watch their backs, though, because there's a new manic- depressive in town. Her name is Jana McCall.

On her self- titled debut, McCall emerges as a plaintive singer/ songwriter with a penchant for gloom. Her somber ruminations on love, death and loss, are sung in a passionless, reverb- soaked voice that heightens feelings of both spaciousness and isolation. Combining spare instrumentation, slide guitars ("Mother of Earth") and sloth- like tempos ("Again and Again"), this is rainy day music for rainy day people, a natural background for a bathtub session with the collected works of Sylvia Plath.

While it has its moments, the album is solid but unspectacular, successfully evoking and sustaining a mood but lacking memorable moments. The songs are well- written but tend to bleed into one another without differentiation, a quality that lends cohesiveness but ultimately leaves things feeling a bit flat. When McCall hits it just right, such as on "Mother of Earth," it's easy to see the talent at work and you can imagine her making a great album. This isn't it, but with a little more variety in tempo, instrumentation or theme, McCall could become one to watch.

-Mark Richard-San