Through All the Pain, Korn Delivers Signs of Progress

** 1/2 KORN

“Issues”

Immortal/Epic

Ah, to be young and in pain. “All I want in life is to be happy,” chants Jonathan Davis to open Korn’s fourth excursion through internal hells. Don’t bet on it. Misery can be as addictive as any drug, and there’s no evidence here that he wants to relinquish the hurt inside that has become his identity and livelihood.

When he moans, “I need somebody,” in “Somebody Someone,” he’s not asking for help, but for someone to share the psychic agony. And pointedly, that short opening ode to happiness, with its ironic, bagpipe-laced wistfulness, is titled “Dead”--as in that’s what you are if you don’t feel deep pain. It’s hardly a new idea (try Nine Inch Nails, not to mention the Marquis de Sade or “Hamlet”), but Davis sells it well, and he certainly means it.

The real progress is in the music, the richest array of sounds the band (including Davis’ shape-shifting voice) has made, comparable in places to, if derivative of, Trent Reznor’s work. Just when the pounding beats and guitars seem relentless, they’re relieved, if momentarily, by colorful and nuanced textures.

Best, the band separates itself from the frat-boy vapidness of Limp Bizkit’s metal-rap. One song is titled “Let’s Get This Party Started,” but this ain’t no party. Just ask any teen who feels that these songs are about his or her life.

*

Albums are rated on a scale of one star (poor), two stars (fair), three stars (good) and four stars (excellent). The albums are already released unless otherwise noted.