By Joshua Gross

Daily Arts Writer

Amanda Ghost is the next best thing. The new girl in town. Elton John really likes her. So do Boy George, Rolling Stone and Joni Mitchell. You'll be singing her songs soon: They've engineered it that way. You think you will resist. You won't.

Her debut album, Ghost Stories, begins like any other bad techno album, a repetitive beat with strained vocals that sound like they're coming from the cold-sore smeared mouth of a pasty, pimple-faced diva who is too waifish and unappealing to launch any career other than that of singing the strained vocals on a droning techno album. The song is called "Filthy Mind" and tries to be sexual, but it is just unoriginal and boring.

The second song is a complete turn around. "Idol" is a poppy ditty about yearning for a submissive love that would almost be entertaining if it hadn't been given the Goo Goo Dolls, test-audience, lyrics manipulated so they can be sung more easily by girls with trendy sapphire-colored braces, TRL treatment. Half the album is as forgettable as this tune. The other half is a little different.

The redeeming songs are those that allow Ghost to capitalize on the more soulful octaves she can reach but these songs, "Cellophane," "A Child Believes," "Numb" and "Empty." However, these have been fenced in at three and a half minutes apiece like beautiful prisoners that grandmothers see on television, sitting as still as statues except for their heads, which shake sadly in disapproval. "What a shame," they whisper in unison.

Amanda Ghost should have tried a little harder, made the songs a little longer, sung a little stronger, ached a little more. She has a nice voice. It's a shame that her studio/agent/producer/ image-consultant tried to turn her into something that she isn't instead of allowing her to freely explore her own lush musical terrain.

Grade: C