Andy Dragazis, the man behind Blue States, apparently divides his residential status between England and Greece, spending half the year in each country. Perhaps that accounts for his music's curious dichotomy. For while it's anchored in the rainy-day downtempo grooves that served so well for Portishead and their forlorn descendants, Nothing Changes Under the Sun is buoyed by irrepressible cheeriness.

The music is still determinedly slow, but it's more the languorous pace of a sleeping sunbather than the morose metre of squalid failure. Sixties ambience abounds, most notably the overt influence of James Bond themes. "Diamente" does this most obviously with its opening sample, but you'll also detect Connery-era orchestral opulence in the squiggly-beat- infused "Stereo 99", not to mention the seductively feline proto-funk of "Golden Touch."

It's also fairly obvious that Dragazis owns a few Air (French Band) records. He avoids overtly ripping them off, but the album is peppered with little "Air moments"; once you train your ear to listen for them, they become so obvious that you'll forget you're not listening to an actual Air record.

Nothing Changes Under the Sun saves its most potent charge for its midpoint; "Your Girl," a blend of Easy Listening gentility and creepy, ice-cold girl/woman vocals, plants itself in lyrical ambiguity. "If you want me for your girl/ all you have to do is see/that you're not the boy for me," the vocalist repeats, delivering her dismissal of affection with chillingly elegant sincerity. The voice is suspect; given the lack of a vocal credit, I'm inclined to wonder if cries of "That's not a woman -- it's Andy Dragazis, baby!" are in order.

As I mentioned, Nothing Changes Under the Sun is ultimately a cheerful record, and it betrays its creator's European heritage most prominently in its final minutes. Witness "Elios Therepia", a stirring, western-like theme that seems to have been torn directly from the soundtrack of a 1960s European adventure film. Likewise, "Cherio Manou" bows to the gods of jetset pop, registering droning organ lines and frisky acoustic guitar strumming that wouldn't sound out of place on a March Records sampler.

It's a shame that Dragazis can't quite avoid the traps that mire his less cheerful peers. Prolonged listening to Nothing Changes Under the Sun causes the record to blur into a single mass of relaxed tempos, Airisms and unhurried melodies, with only a few songs ("Diamente", "Your Girl") truly standing out. It doesn't help that we're dealing with a genre that can easily leave its listeners too defocused to pay the music proper attention. Your ability to absorb and differentiate will determine the album's success.

Ultimately, Nothing Changes Under the Sun proves its title wrong by injecting some much needed cheer into a joy-depleted genre. Like the Grecian holiday whose moods it mirrors, specific details may vanish all too quickly...but it leaves behind fond memories.