On new album, Billy Idol sings of sacrifices of being a former rock idol

For a singer whose curled upper lip and primal shrieks are his most recognized signatures, Billy Idol has made a new album that is surprisingly a retrospective of all the things we don’t know him for yet: playfully self-deprecating, introspective and a bit remorseful.

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Idol, who headlines the Riviera Saturday, is on the road with a recent autobiography and “Kings and Queens of the Underground” (BFI Records), his first album in eight years. Both projects reveal the British punk rocker, now 59, as unabashed regarding his hedonistic heyday as an MTV idol, but also frank about the sacrifices he made to make sure he enjoyed it.

The title song references his glory years, a weird bit of self-referential exorcising but revealing for backstage admissions: “Sold all my vinyl — It went up my arm/And I thought rock ‘n’ roll wouldn’t do me no harm,” he sings. Other moments reflect late-age fidelity — “I don’t want to do it alone/I need you here with me now,” he sings on “Save Me Now,” a brooding song with a breakout chorus reminiscent of his arena days.

That’s as defiant as Idol sounds on this album of distinguished, mid-tempo rockers, catchy elecro-rockers, and ballads that show he is a credible crooner. While Idol dismisses much of what he sees from the L.A. strip nightlife (“The screamin’ fans/Holdin’ out their hands/It’s all empty man,” he sings), he is not fully retired to the bedroom community just yet. “Whiskey and Pills” is a punk love letter to two of his favorite things. Whooping it up while riding a galloping beat, it’s obvious some old habits die hard.

Mark Guarino is a local freelance writer.

Billy Idol and “Kings and Queens of the Underground”: