A dreamy-looking Malkmus, sporting a vintage t-shirt and a tanned countenance, poses against a retiring blue sky at sunset, his face partially obscured by shadows; the cover of Stephen Malkmus announced “solo album” with all the subtlety of a Red Fang music video. The conspicuous mullet isn’t fooling anyone, either — surely it is the mullet of a man with an advanced degree in the Humanities. This is, of course, all part of the fun. Malkmus wanted to release the album under the name the Jicks (and under the title Swedish Reggae) until Matador strongly discouraged him from doing so. The cover portrait, then — more Can I Borrow A Feeling? than Horses — is Malkmus’ twisted idea of a last laugh. But if the cover suggests songs about the joys of marriage and Subaru ownership — perhaps featuring one or two acoustic numbers featuring the London Symphony Orchestra — the album, thankfully, delivers nothing of the sort. While retaining the cryptic word scrambles and haughty existentialism he’s been perfecting since the first Pavement single, Malkmus’ lyrical focus has widened to accommodate coherent character vignettes and linear, if fragmented, narratives. The most noticeable change, though, is the guitar playing. Somewhere around the time of Terror Twilight, Malkmus grew into a proficient and unique guitarist, with a style recalling Robert Fripp auditioning for the Voidoids. Stephen Malkmus also finds Malkmus at something of a songwriting peak: “Church On White” is a piece in the likes of starry-eyed Pavement favorites like “Grounded” and “Stop Breathin,'” and features some beautifully slippery Travis Bean guitar harmonies; “Pink India,” with its unforgettable and oft-tweeted couplet of “I had a crap gin and tonic/ it wounded me,” is breezily psychedelic; “Trojan Curfew” is distinguished by languid slide guitar and one-handed piano; and the droll, cowbell-assisted “The Hook” sounds like Jonathan Richman covering Some Girls. The album also contains some duds, like the silly and condescending “Jenny And The Ess Dog” (whose pilfering of the melody from Elliot Smith’s “Say Yes” is the least of its loathsome crimes), and the cheeky Yul Brenner-ode “Jo-Jo’s Jacket,” which sounds like something Fountains of Wayne might have relegated to a B-side.