Thank You, Mark is a schizophrenic album. It’s partly swingin’ bluesy good-time music and partly the sort of generic adult contemporary-style Americana songs you find on the free CD that comes with Paste magazine – you know, the ones you skip over to get to the two good tunes they included that issue.

A lot of this split personality is due to the (mostly) arid, squeaky clean production by Mark Bryan. Given the title of the album, I have to think that Howle is happy with the way things turned out. Sometimes, I can see why. On the bluesier numbers Bryan steps back out of the way and lets the musicians get on with business. And I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention the wistful note captured on “This Kind of Light”; it sets the mood and tone nicely without beating the listener over the head.

But for every relaxed rootsy tune, there’s another that just antiseptic and airless. Take “Roses From Leroy’s”. The lyric would have made a swell short story. But as a song it’s so entirely “radio-friendly”, so desperate to tickle that Starbucks demographic, that it sounds utterly drained of anything like fun. It’s like listening to factory workers punching the clock to start their shift: it doesn’t really make me want to dance. And maybe that’s intentional. It occurs to me now that this may just be Bryan giving Howle what she wanted, in which case I don’t know what to think.

And yadda yadda yadda. All production values aside, the drawing card here is Howle’s voice: cool and sumptuous, yet able to cut loose and leave a mark when she lets it. Hell, on the cover of Etta James’ “If I Can’t Have You” she creates the illusion that her duet partner, Darius “Don’t call me Hootie” Rucker, might actually have a tiny amount of soul in him – and that is no small feat. I’m guessing she’s really something, live. In the studio, at least this time out, it’s hit and miss. Surely there must be a take of “Fields of Cotton” that’s not so self-conscious (and doesn’t have the tacked-on, “it’s a rural song so there’s gotta be a harmonica” harmonica).

I really wanted to like this album as much as I like Howle’s voice. Thank You, Mark would make a nice EP if you culled the stiffs. As it stands, it’s scattershot in a way that doesn’t really do her any favors. Here’s hoping she loosens up on her next outing; if she does, I suspect she’ll find that airplay she seems to be hunting.

Danielle Howle's Thank You, Mark is available through Valley Entertainment.