MERCHANT MOMENTUM MIXED.

Byline: Amy Dawes Daily News Staff Writer

Don't expect Natalie Merchant to deliver letter-perfect replays of her radio hits in her two L.A. concerts this week; her split with former band mates 10,000 Maniacs was all about gaining some creative space, and she gives herself lots of it.

Playing at the outdoor Santa Barbara Bowl on Monday night, the alternative rock icon seemed to take palpable joy and satisfaction in delivering Natalie unbound, a reborn, unfettered performer who can give her sensual, insouciant vocals the room they deserve and take her inner-driven music into Eastern-influenced psychedelic jams, trombone-led party mixes or wherever the spirit moves her.

Merchant's self-produced and self-financed solo debut album ``Tigerlily'' was panned by critics as too bland, slow and self-centered; but its lilting and hypnotic ballads gained steady favor with record-buyers, making the album, ironically, the most commercially successful of Merchant's entire career.

It has exceeded double-platinum sales, spent almost a year in Billboard's Top 40 and spawned three radio singles, including the top-10 hit ``Carnival.''

Back through Southern California after an 11-month tour of the United States and Europe, Merchant performed eight of the album's 11 tunes, starting her Monday show, appropriately, with ``San Andreas Fault,'' a casually seductive ballad that sets its blithe, beckoning melody against a tale of dashed hopes in the paradisiacal West.

The song soars in concert, propelled by Merchant's husky, diaphonous vocals, drummer Peter Yanowitz's percolating rhythms and a bold saxophone solo.

But as quickly as Merchant had grabbed the crowd's attention, she lost it, following with ``River,'' a tribute to the late actor River Pheonix that was defeated by a muddy vocal mix and its dubious melodic interest.

Momentum returned, however, with a tasty segue into the intriguing ``album alternative'' and college radio staples ``Eat for Two,'' ``Wonder'' and ``Carnival,'' and a carnival version of 10,000 Maniacs' ``These Are Days,'' led by a honking trombone solo that called to mind B-52's-style nuttiness.

Merchant, who looked like a geek-chic version of a wholesome ingenue in her early-'60s pink party dress and white pumps, flung her long hair around and blissed out in trancelike, joyfully weird dances, as if to say, ``It's my party, and I'll fly if I want to.'' Indeed, she does.

Most prominent in Merchant's concert lineup is the distinctive voice of guitarist Jennifer Turner, who mixes a fuzz-toned aggressiveness with spiritually attuned noodlings, sometimes enhancing and sometimes competing with Merchant's vibe in a nervy mix that to say the least, keeps things interesting.

Once a songwriter who set out to slyly afflict the comfortable, Merchant in her new incarnation seems more drawn to comforting the afflicted, and her soothing vocals can achieve hymnlike beauty, as on the new song ``I May Know the Word.''

But the subtleties are lost on some. Starting promptly at 8 in the pre-twilight, Merchant intially had to weave her spell without benefit of concert lighting, and much of the Santa Barbara crowd continued chattering throughout, stopping only to jump up and dance to the radio hits. Perhaps that's why she kept it short, delivering a 70-minute set followed by two encores.

After her Greek Theatre dates, Merchant joins the H.O.R.D.E. tour for two weeks in mid-July, then tours as a special guest with Sting.