Unlikely as it may seem, William Shatner might be the ultimate icon for Generation Irony. At a regal and self-deprecating 73 years old, the actor has had plenty of time to marinate in his own persona. Shatner established his ironclad, overblown style as the heroic interplanetary paramour Captain James T. Kirk on the short-lived 1960s TV series "Star Trek". His placement in syndication purgatory and the pop culture zeitgeist of the latter half of the 20th century was reinforced by his turn beside the impossibly-hot-for-a-cop Heather Locklear in the equally short-lived "T.J. Hooker".

His recording career is lesser-known. In 1968, Shatner made The Transformed Man, a surreal, comical work that placed ridiculous readings of pop hits ("Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds", "Mr. Tambourine Man") alongside recitations of selected Shakespeare passages. Despite Shatner's serious intentions, the album was received as pure kitsch, and the cover songs ended up on a 1988 Rhino novelty comp called Golden Throats: The Great Celebrity Sing-Off!

A few years ago, Shatner the Singer resurfaced on "In Love", an intriguing, well-received cut from Ben Folds' Fear of Pop project. Folds enlisted Shatner based on his childhood fascination with The Transformed Man, and the two began a friendship that has now culminated with Has Been, a collection of 11, um, pieces-- spoken word vignettes, theatrical readings, droll musings-- so out of leftfield that any discussion of the album will necessarily stray from the field of music criticism and into pop culture analysis. While this humble music publication is hardly the platform to debate the merits and impact of irony in modern art, I will say that I'm glad that Shatner decided to make this music now. It's so confusing, enthralling, sincere, profound, and trite that it's nothing short of a mirror to society's own incongruities. Which, really, is quite an achievement.

Folds' easygoing way with thematic contradiction-- smug sincerity, for one example; nerd chic for another-- makes him the ideal musical foil for Shatner's full-frontal Shatnerizing (it's a word, google it). Whether you know him from his early work, his hammy Priceline TV spots, or his recent tour de force as legal eagle Denny Crane on "The Practice" and its spinoff "Boston Legal", you know what I'm talking about. William Shatner's histrionic. Verbal. Cadence is the stuff of. Legend and. Many. A comedy routine. And fortunately, he never deigns himself to sing. But it's the fact that he's in on the joke these days that elevates him to some kind of groundbreaking standard-bearer of self-aware irony and innate honesty.

Can those two elements co-exist? Remarkably, they do on Has Been-- even after multiple listens. For an album I approached ready to shrug off as sheer novelty, its humor and candor give it a fair amount of staying power. Turn up the burlesque swing of "Ideal Woman" or the title track's goofy spaghetti western rant at a party and watch the room go silent. Shatner's voice is naturally magnetic, lending alternating gravitas and levity; his delivery is that of an accomplished actor, so with only a slight deviation of emphasis he can shift from bombastic to sullen.

But bombast is what he does best. His power-pop cover of Pulp's "Common People" has Joe Jackson going grandiose with Shatner and a chorus with upwards of 60 vocalists. His duet with Henry Rollins on "I Can't Get Behind That" is pure raging comedy set over abstract guitar screams from King Crimson's Adrian Belew, and his riff on mortality on the jazzy "You'll Have Time" is plainly hilarious. "That's Me Trying" might sum up the work best, with Folds' plaintive piano matched with acoustic guitar as Shatner tells a story of a deadbeat dad trying to make good. The song was written by High Fidelity and About a Boy novelist Nick Hornby, and stays aloof and alluring with convoluted pathos and inadvertent wit.

However, when Shatner dips into the saccharine jar, things don't fare as well. "It Hasn't Happened Yet" is maudlin and dull, and the tragic story of "What Have You Done?" is too depressing to belong on an otherwise lighthearted album. Still, there's a great amount of range here, both musically and lyrically, and Folds and Shatner take it all in stride. Weird, I know, but it works.