A Bluer Shade Of Black

PERFORMER: CLINT BLACK

ALBUM: NO TIME TO KILL

LABEL: RCA

THE BOTTOM LINE: Clint Black raises his radio-ready country pop to a higher level by adding a sobering dose of introspection.

Coroners, clowns and country singers should never be too happy; there’s just something about their work that makes a crying-on-the-inside quality appropriate. Luckily for fans of country singer Clint Black — and unfortunately, perhaps, for the man himself — he is one of those people whose disquiet, in his lyrics at least, has increased as a function of his rising success. The reasoning of such people tends to be variants on the following: I have a new car, a home, a pretty wife . . . Hmmm. Now that I have these things I could lose them: my car could be stolen, my wife could run off; in a worst- case scenario my wife could drive my car into my house and everything might explode. I am now more unhappy than ever . . .

Successful at his career, and by outward appearances happily married to actress Lisa Hartman (Knots Landing), Black has become even more introspective about the best things in life — including love and residency in Texas. The heartland heartthrob’s first album, released in 1989 when he was younger and single, was titled Killin’ Time; now 31, less single and a lot wiser, Black finds life more precious; No Time to Kill is the title of his new CD and its best song.

Black thinks of himself not just as an heir to country, but as a child of pop; he grew up listening to such mainstream stars as James Taylor and Jackson Browne. Nonetheless, many songs on Black’s first three albums seemed stiff and traditional; the intensity of his emotions was displayed only rarely. On No Time to Kill, collaborators help bring out the best in him. In A Bad Goodbye, he sings a duet with Wynonna Judd, who draws out an emotional edge in his ! voice. On Happiness Alone, Black and co-writer Jimmy Buffet turn the usual country formula inside out, creating a refreshing pop song with just an echo of country twang: “A man can’t survive on happiness alone.”

Black also delivers on I’ll Take Texas, a fiddle-and-steel guitar paean to his home state, and on Tuckered Out, a rollicking tribute to country stars that sneaks the names of Merle Haggard, Waylon Jennings and others into the verses: “I’m Haggard, worn and Waylon,” Black sings and slyly inserts his own name into the musical testimonial. Even as he frets about time running out, you know his time has come.