Life is sweet when you're Jack Johnson.

With a beach house in Hawaii, wife, kid and budding musical career, America's favorite beachcomber turned acoustic groove rocker seems to have things pretty well figured out. At least that's the impression one would get from listening to his mellow mesh of funk, blues, folk and hip hop. His music almost exists in a sort of pristine utopia of beautiful women and sunny skies, a place where love at first sight is the norm and nights are spent by the fire with a guitar in hand. With his charming laid-back demeanor and imperturbable outlook on life, Johnson may be the closet thing our young generation has to Jimmy Buffett.

And while the rest of us can do little more than sit and dream of an existence that so closely resembles paradise, Johnson's music has always been able to bring us a little bit closer to that happy place, if only for the 30-something minutes his records typically span. In Between Dreams, Johnson's third record, finds the songwriter coasting along the same placid waters sailed upon by his previous two efforts. Yeah, it's been done, but some artists are perfectly comfortable with adopting a sound and sticking with it, and in the case of Jack Johnson, thank goodness for that.

The album kicks off with "Better Together," a smooth, almost hypnotically calm track that finds Johnson's soft-spoken vocal style harmonizing over a gently strummed guitar and splashy cymbals. Again, this could aptly describe the majority of cuts that make the record, but none come off quite as well as here.

When Johnson does take a stab at shifting gears, as on the Barry White-ish low-fi funk rocker "Crying Shame," strides are made, however small, beyond the breezy carefree acoustic tracks that fill the album's every corner. Other highlights include the heartfelt "If I Could," where Jack celebrates birth and mourns loss over bongo drums and the echo of a harmonica.

Mario Caldato's return as producer gives Dreams the same crisp sound quality afforded Johnson's last effort, On and On, one that capitalizes upon every breezy nuance that sweeps through the record.

It would be a stretch to say that Johnson has come a long way since Brushfire Fairytales. He hasn't, but the baby steps he takes towards expanding his horizons are small but noticeable. In addition to standard session players Adam (bass) and Merlo (drums), Johnson occassionally brings in players from th outside to fill in the gaps, such as Zach Gill's accordian on "Belle." It's a small touch, but an effective one towards giving the album a bit more variation.

In Between Dreams still finds Captain Jack steering his musical ship on a steady course and avoiding the waves, but that's exactly what it set out to do. Johnson remains fixed at a crossroads somewhere in between cult hero and full on rock star, a place where he's less likely to be as revered as Hendrix but more as that chill guy with the guitar on the beach. That's cool, though, and odds are that's just the way he wants things to be.

Grade: B

This article appeared in The Marquette Tribune on Mar. 10 2005.