The quavering voice floats in on ether trails, pulling you into a tender, glistening world where Adonis stands alone with a microphone on a softly lit stage. Subtle rhythms boil up via a twisting guitar and gently rolling drums. As the chorus turns, the phasing guitar and vocals stretch toward the ceiling, creating a misty column of pure music.

Such are the images summoned forth by Jeff Buckley's first and only solo record, an experienced debut to say the least. Buckley was 28 and a veteran of performance (including stints with Shinehead and Gods and Monsters) when he recorded this 10-song opus with bassist Mick Grondahl and drummer Matt Johnson. Building on echoes of influences as varied as the avant jazz-rock stylings of his father, Tim Buckley, the powerful crooning of Van Morrisson, and the classically sculpted riffs of Led Zeppelin, Buckley is as elegant a rock star as we had in the '90s. Had he been able to endure in the public's eye, he may have touched the lives of millions with his songcraft and talent. As destiny would have it, he was swallowed by the Mississippi on the eve of recording his second album, leaving Grace as his only realized work.

But the album leaves a lasting impression of an artist whose exceptional talents never got to grow to their limits. His guitar paints lustrous pictures all over the record, and his golden vocal pipes are almost unmatched - sometimes revealing shadows of one of his inspirations, the otherworldly voice of qawaali deity Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan.

At times, he is almost too tender. "Corpus Christi Carol" features only sparse instrumentation accompanying Buckley's interpretation of the traditional hymn. Lyrics like "the falcon hath borne my maid away" seem a little archaic in the forum of '90s rock music, but they somehow fit right in with Buckley's oeuvre. "Carol" is only one of three covers Buckley chooses to flesh out over the course of the album, including an evocative version of Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah," but the best tracks are his own.

Classic pop songs "Grace" and "Last Goodbye" ride over rolling landscapes of guitar riffage, Buckley entreating his loves with poetic lyrics and a voice pregnant with desire. The album's centrepiece, however, is the epic "Lover, You Should've Come Over," which melts out of a stately organ invocation, and exquisitely sets the mood of rainy day regret. A seductive chord progression accentuates Buckley's voice as tension builds throughout the first two verses, only to break out and head for the clouds. A Motown-style choir of backing vocals helps propel the song toward its tumultous climax.