THE PROS AND CONS OF HITCH HIKING

"The Pros and Cons of Hitchhiking" (**1/2) ROGER WATERS' first post-FLOYD album is stylistically similar to "The Final Cut": the swaying between outrage and amusement, the whispered confessionals, the dropping of the other shoe. What "The Pros and Cons of Hitchhiking" lacks are actual songs, instead hovering in the same musical holding pattern like one long coda. The album is intriguing in construct, based on a reverie in which WATERS imagines an encounter with a female hitchhiker. Despite the similarities to FLOYD's last album, "Pros and Cons" is a work that only Waters could make, in part because he'd have a hard time explaining this concept to his bandmates (who probably would have rejected the idea out of hand). There are fleeting moments when Hitchhiking clicks, but generally this is an elusive effort. The supporting cast is a mix of readers/singers (CHERRY VANILLA, JACK PALANCE) and musicians (MICHAEL KAMEN, ERIC CLAPTON), not unlike PETE TOWNSHEND's Psychoderelict. CLAPTON gets off a few nice leads (though, in retrospect, he was probably sorry he came along for the ride), DAVID SANBORN explodes on occasion, and MICHAEL KAMEN's piano plays an important part in the final product, but musical showmanship is not what Hitchhiking is about.

That said, I'm not really sure what this album is about: a musical mid-life crisis, a long scratch of the playwright's itch, a purging of more inner demons? It could be seen as the last in a trilogy begun with "The Wall", since the three works sound so similar, and yet that comparison diminishes Hitchhiking. "The Wall" was monumental, The Final Cut parochial, and Hitchhiking inconsequential. It ends where it began, back in the warm arms of an immeasurable ennui, smug despite having delivered on none of its promise. You can tag along if you want to, but I can think of more cons than pros.