You were expecting Elvis' kid to go into, say, construction?

Didn't think so. Instead, the inevitably inevitable has come to pass: Lisa Marie Presley is going into the rock-star business.

Is she ready? Are we ready? Ready or not, To Whom It May Concern, the debut album from the King of Rock 'n' Roll's lone offspring, will bow in stores April 8, Capital Records announced Friday.

"This is me. This record is me. Every song is me," Presley said in a statement released through her label. "You're going to see who I really am and not what the tabloids say or whatever anyone has to say about me."

Presley handles lead vocals and shares songwriting credits with the likes of ex-Smashing Pumpkins frontman Billy Corgan, on most of the album's 11 tracks. Sorry, there are no Elvis covers. But the first single, the country/rock-ish "Lights Out," does touch on her roots--specifically, her (and her famous daddy's) Memphis roots.

"Someone turned the lights out there in Memphis/That's where my family's buried and gone/Last time I was there I noticed a space left/Next to them there in Memphis in the damn back lawn," goes a "Lights Out" refrain.

Larry Flick, senior talent editor for Billboard magazine, has sampled the cut. His verdict: "It's actually quite good."

Flick described Presley's voice as "smoky," offering country queen Wynonna Judd as comparison. Los Angeles radio programmer Chris Patyk said he found the single "very Sheryl Crow."

While those are words sure to warm a record promoter's alleged heart, they're not the whole story. When it comes to Lisa Marie Presley, the whole story involves lots and lots of baggage.

"The first time you listen to her record, you're first listening to hear if you can hear her father in it," Flick said. "And then the second time, you listen to the lyrics--to see if there's anything about Elvis in them."

And so goes the challenge of selling Elvis' daughter--she's the new artist who's not really new.

"It's more like she's famous for being famous," Flick said. "In the music industry, that's really harder to overcome."

To be sure, Presley has not jumped to fill her father's jumpsuit. Nor has she rushed to prove herself in any other profession. She turns 35 on February 1, having most notably raised two children, with first husband Danny Keough, who worked on the new album. Outside of being Elvis' kid, she is best known for marrying (and divorcing) Michael Jackson, and, later, marrying (and divorcing) Nicolas Cage.

Presley was 9 when Elvis died in 1977. She was offered her first music contract as a teenager. She declined. She would be 20 before she even warbled in front of another person. (Or so the legend goes, per her record label.)

While she once appeared in a music video with Jackson, Presley rejected other offers that ostensibly would have made her a star in her own right, including, she said, a Vanilla Ice flick.

"I didn't want to do anything just based on who I am," she said in the statement.

But there's no getting around it--she is who she is. "I kind of feel for her, to be honest," Flick said. "If she wants to be a credible music artist, she first needs to deal with who she is."

Likely, audiences also are going to need to deal with who she is.

Patyk, assistant program director and music director of L.A.'s Star 98.7 (American Idol's Ryan Seacrest's radio home), said he has been trying out "Lights Out" on ears around the station. First, he plays the song for coworkers. Then, he tells them the identity of the singer.

"All of them were surprised," Patyk said. (And, yes, the surprise was a pleasant one.)

As a programmer, Patyk called "Lights Out" a "great fit" for his station's modern adult contemporary format. He was to test the song out on the air last Sunday night.

"We'll see what the reaction is," Patyk said. "[But] it's definitely on our radar."

The album is also on the radar of Elvis fans. It's just not necessarily high on the radar.

Rich Wilson, copresident of the It's Only Love for Elvis Fan Club, said, in an email interview, that the average King fan is worn out from years of false starts involving the Lisa Marie album (she signed her first deal five years ago).

And besides, according to Wilson, at the end of the day, To Whom It May Concern is not an Elvis album.

"We are Elvis Presley fans first and foremost," Wilson said.

Still, Wilson, for one, intends to pick up a copy of Lisa Marie's debut.

"Not because she is Elvis' daughter but because of what I have heard of her voice," Wilson said. "She reminds me a lot of country music singer Tanya Tucker."

Tanya Tucker. Sheryl Crow. Wynonna. More comparisons, more labels. Another day in the life for you-know-who's kid.