Shortly after Days of the Week popped up on the radio, a friend of mine exclaimed, "Geez, if this is Scott Weiland sober, give him some drugs - quick."

Harsh. You would prefer nothing, I suppose? As one critic once said of Eric Clapton, we prefer him soft and alive rather than hard and dead.

Good news, though: Days of the Weak is definitely not the best song on Stone Temple Pilots' first new album since the volatile and talented frontman cleaned up his act and got out of jail. He's obviously still a little woozy.

Think of this as the opposite of the usual trick. It's not one great single enticing fans to buy a weak album. This is one weak single that might prevent fans from buying an otherwise worthy collection. Mostly worthy, anyway. Just give it a chance.

OK, so Shangri-La Dee Da sometimes comes across like a musical 12-step program. It's more a product of coffee and cigarettes than heroin and cocaine, filled with the often muted reflections of a man who's turned over a new leaf. In A Song For Sleeping, Weiland burbles on about his infant son, Noah, and then croons lines like, "There's so much God can teach you if you only have the time."

Other anti-drug messages and life-affirming platitudes fill this album - more or less an equal mix of mellow pop ballads and grunged-up grooves. Give the slow songs a chance, too: In Hello It's Late, the band seems to be channelling Crowded House, which was a great band we don't hear much from anymore.

You want the hard stuff? The album starts with a terrific rocker from the grunge school: Dumb Love, which seems to be about going through withdrawal.

Also worth skipping past the mellow bits to get to are Coma, Hollywood Bitch and the psychedelic prog-rocker Black Again. Sample lyric from the latter: "She's in hell, but she'll never really be alone as long as I'm beside her."

Keep going to those meetings, Scott.

This is not the best music STP ever came up with, but at least there's probably going to be more in the future. Think of it as a work in progress.

(More on: Stone Temple Pilots)

Track Listing 1. Dumb Love

2. Days Of The Week

3. Coma

4. Hollywood Bitch

5. Wonderful

6. Black Again

7. Hello It's Late

8. Too Cool Queenie

9. Regeneration

10. Bi-Polar Bear

11. Transmissions From A Lonely Room

12. A Song For Sleeping