The R&B Star Miguel at Bowery Ballroom Miguel The Los Angeles R&B star performing at the Bowery Ballroom on Monday, the day before the release of his album "Kaleidoscope Dream." Whatever happened to machismo? Not the rote boasting about sexual conquests and half-cooked promises of caress that typify broad swaths of contemporary R&B, but something sturdier. The husky, unapologetic, beyond confident stuff. The stuff that flexes even the small muscles. The stuff with a few day's beard growth on it. During most of the Los Angeles singer Miguel's concert at the Bowery Ballroom on Monday night, he played it cool. For a show in a small room, it was intensely flashy - a slick outfit, bursts of light at every angle, overstated dance moves. Miguel performed, but he didn't sweat much. But near the end of the night things were winding down, which meant the veneer had thinned a bit. Miguel's guitar player sawed off a few grunge-esque notes, and Miguel began singing a vulgar and wounded song - the title is unprintable, but let's call in "Mine" for short - from his second album, "Kaleidoscope Dream" (ByStorm/RCA), which was released on Tuesday. This was a different thing altogether, past Marvin Gaye aching tenderness to James Brown shouts, and then past that into some soul outer world where the gravity is weaker, and outrageous twists are possible. He tensed up and then melted. He roared with fierce control. He breathed deeply. It was an almost savage performance, and totally draining. And it was macho, in a manner that felt startling and bold. All adults should feel that intensely. Miguel can do that. He doesn't always, but he can. Much of the rest of the time he's playing around with style - musical and sartorial - and tone, and honing his ample songwriting gifts and facile voice. He's a perfectionist in the guise of a risk taker. He has made a place for his slightly left-of-center talent, no small accomplishment in R&B, which can be among the least forgiving genres around, boundary-wise, on a par with country music. But the truth is he is left of today's center, not 1984"s or even 1995"s. He's more retro than avant, and more modern than the retro tag typically signifies. That goes for his outfits too: on the back of his album, it's high-cuffed pants, white socks and creepers. Plus, he's been savvy in handling his currency, doling out the occasional hook for a hip-hop song, most notably on Wale's "Lotus Flower Bomb." "Kaleidoscope Dream" is, purposefully, a little washed-out, a blend of Prince-isms and slurry grooves. Sometimes it's great, sometimes it's on the verge. At the Bowery Ballroom he shook off some of the album's languor in an ardently performed show of new-wave soul that was pristine and committed to it. Often, though, it was to the exclusion of just the sort of sweat intensity that made the performance of "Mine" so thrilling. He was smooth, in a slim red blazer, and with his hair frozen upward into a cool, swooping curl. And for the most part he was effective, from the raucous and full-bodied "Use Me" to the moist "Gravity" to even the vexing agit-soul song "Candles in the Sun," which he rescued from didacticism with subdued, heavy breathing. "Sure Thing," one of his most concise hits, was here swollen and extended with vamps that could have come from the Love Unlimited Orchestra. Unexpectedly, one of the loosest moments was also his biggest hit, "Adorn," which was originally released as part of his series of "Art Dealer Chic" EPs this summer. It's a tightly wound slow burner, a plea that comes from a place of certainty, not desperation. It has far more to do with Prince's rock-soul throb than anything else in the genre today, and yet it's been a success. There were a few other moments of pep, like his early hit "All I Want Is You," and the rendition of 2Pac's "I Get Around" he tossed off just after he shook the room with "Mine." But that moment felt like a retreat, or as if he could only manage that level of force and vim for so long before exhaling and getting back to boasting as usual.