Peering out mole-like from behind his stack of artful tunes and rickety wooden gear, Manchester singer-songsmith Damon Gough -- a.k.a. Badly Drawn Boy -- is an unlikely candidate for pop-music saviour.

The guy looks like he'd just as soon pull his now-trademark wool hat over his face as perform. After scooping up Britain's coveted Mercury Prize for his album The Hour Of Bewilderbeast, he recently dropped off his record company's radar rather than face an onslaught of North American interviews. Fair enough.

Fact is, Hour Of Bewilderbeast, which came out last summer, is worth the fuss, and mainly because the moon-faced Gough is as uncompromising a musician as he is a personality.

He's musically indebted to Nick Drake -- a trendy retro reference, yes, but the aching cello and French horns on opening tune The Shining is straight out of the (very) late Drake's Five Leaves Left -- and his clear passion for orchestral-pop and jazz run through his work like a pulse.

But what's most striking is Gough's ability to pack so many sounds into a 64-minute sitting without hampering the overall grace of the record. Bewilderbeast's 18 tracks flow from start to finish like a chronological best-of. There are wide-eyed and wistful reflections (The Shining, Everybody's Stalking), clattering, watery grooves (Fall In A River) and weird, electro-edged doodlings (Body Rap, Once Around The Block). He doesn't even get into the harps and loungey vocals until after half-time.

Low on production and high on ideals, there's a lot of album to digest here. There's also more to Gough than Nick Drake's ghost.

Badly Drawn Boy plays Lee's Palace Wednesday night.

Recommended for fans of: Elliott Smith, Belle & Sebastian.

Track Listing 1.The Shining
  02.Everybodys Stalking
  03.Bewilder
  04.Fall In The River
  05.Camping Next To Water
  06.Stone On The Water
  07.Another Pearl
  08.Body Rap
  09.Once Around The Block
  10.This Song
  11.Bewilderbeast
  12.Magic In The Air
  13.Cause A Rockslide
  14.Pissing In The Wind
  15.Blistered Heart
  16.Disillusion
  17.Say It Again
  18.Epitaph