T Bone Burnett's swan song as a recording artist, 'The Invisible Light: Acoustic Space' sounds a big note

LOS ANGELES - A couple of possible interpretations arise out of the sonic effects superstar producer T Bone Burnett uses to tweak his vocals on his first new studio album in a dozen years, "The Invisible Light: Acoustic Space."

The distanced quality of a voice immersed in richly atmospheric soundscapes that Burnett, 71, has created suggests some extraterrestrial terrain light-years away or perhaps an inner voice from deep within struggling to be heard against the noise of the outer world.

"I didn't want it to be naturalistic," Burnett explained while seated at a broad, elegant wood dinner table at his home in Brentwood. "I wanted it to be electronic and from another place ... like it was coming from this other land where all this stuff is happening. 'Itopia' - that's what I've been calling it."

Wherever that voice might originate from,