Deborah Coleman WHAT ABOUT LOVE? (Telarc)

Some performers never capture the spirit and the energy of their live performances in the studio, and so it may be for blueswoman Deborah Coleman. Despite her stinging way with a Stratocaster and her winning stage presence, What About Love? is the latest in a string of disappointing releases.

Part of that’s due to the songwriting. An album of love songs — most of which are abstract, not rooted in tale spinning — is hardly novel. And there’s nothing in these simple rhymes and homilies to turn heads. The best track is the instrumental "River World," where Coleman’s guitar grinds and chimes its way through what sounds like a musical examination of love’s darker moods. The disc also suffers from her laid-back vocal delivery. If nothing else, sheer energy can salvage a weak number. But no such luck in these tracks. Her take on the Everly Brothers’ "When Will I Be Loved?" is particularly inadequate next to their original performance and Linda Ronstadt’s up-tempo version. The closing "A Woman in Love" counterbalances staid writing with warm, melodic guitar turns, but even there she’s not reaching the kind of peaks her playing achieves in concert, where she consistently lives up to her reputation as a hard-working star of the genre.

(Deborah Coleman appears this Friday, May 21, at Chan’s, 267 Main Street in Woonsocket call 401-765-1900.)