Some people are already defined.

Others can't or won't see them as what they are, just what they were.

For Colin James, that's blues rocker, thanks to high-profile hits in the late '80s and the early '90s, such as Five Long Years and Just Came Back.

This despite two jump swing albums with his Little Big Band.

And despite his last album Fuse, which was an eclectic, more contemporary mix of styles and sounds.

Well, if none of those albums have altered the picture and perception of the performer, then maybe his latest release Traveler will.

Maybe now when people think of Colin James, they do so as singer-songwriter.

"I don't do it on purpose -- I don't think I ever set out to," says James, who opens for Bryan Adams tonight at the 'Dome.

"I'm sure there's a contingent that are going to come up and go, 'Well, I want you to rock,' and there are some songs that do that (on Traveler). But I didn't wanted to just repeat what I did with Fuse, and I wanted to write more ..."

The writing bug which hit him with Fuse bred the majority of the tracks that make up Traveler, including co-writes with The Odds Craig Northey, who was a co-producer and major collaborator James' last time out.

And to further the singer-songwriter motif, the album was recorded at the legendary Paramour Studios in the hills of L.A. with producer-musician-engineer-mixer Mark Howard, who's worked with a number of country and alt country artists such as Ian Tyson, Charley Pride, Vic Chesnutt and more recently at the helm of Lucinda Williams' brilliant World Without Tears record.

While ultimately James thinks he got the desired results and sonic feel from using Howard, he also concedes there was "a little tension" between he, the perfectionist, and Howard, the imperfectionist.

"Sometimes you don't realize what the producer's bringing to the table when you're there ... I know what he brings (now). He doesn't like to overproduce," says James, explaining there were a few imperfections that he would have normally removed which made it onto the disc.

"He really made me leave those things in, and it made me kind of angry at first, because it is my record.

"And I thought 'That's why I hired you, so do what you do' and I'm really happy we did it that way now."

One of the tracks where Howard's barebones, feeling over performance approach can be heard is on one of three covers that grace the record, and one that speaks volumes to what James was attempting to do on Traveler.

It's a stark, mournful version of Nick Drake's Black Eyed Dog, which James says is "unlike anything I've put on tape before. When I first thought of doing the song, I actually laughed at the notion of me singing, I couldn't quite imagine it ...

"And then it stuck with me and stuck with me," he says, noting it was recorded on the third take, with no overdubs, candles in the studio, and rare L.A. rain falling outside. "It was a really beautiful moment. And we were going to bury it in the record a little bit, but I really wanted it to be the halfway point -- I didn't want to hide it."