The Spirit Salon’s conceit — delivered to some uncertain degree of seriousness — is of a seance that conjures an assortment of rogues and rakes from across the centuries who tell stories the likes of “Light Entertainer in Prison” and “My Girlfriend Was Insulted by a Futurist Artist.” The ouija board is a lo-fi synthesizer, and the medium is Toronto-via-Bradford, England’s Ross Hawkins, whose music hall/Jacques Brel/Serge Gainsbourg influences and lyrical allusions to Ford Madox Ford and the Count of Saint-Germain fairly scream “grad student.” There’s plenty of ear and brain candy on The Spirit Salon, but while Hawkins is a writer of some real wit, his songs are often overwhelmed by the unceasing archness of his delivery and the mannered theatricality of the whole project. As an album, it’s too often merely a good read.