Hey, Sean Combs! Less than five months ago you were acquitted on four counts of gun possession and one count of bribery, the first bright point in your career since before Biggie Smalls was killed. What are you gonna do now? Here’s Combs’s unconventional plan. First, a name change: from the mildly laughable Puff Daddy to the inexplicable P. Diddy. Second, more run-ins with the law: Puff was cited for driving a motor scooter without a license in Miami in March and is allegedly being sought, again by Miami police, to answer drunk-driving allegations in connection with a July road mishap.

But it’s his bold new musical move — P. Diddy & the Bad Boy Family’s The Saga Continues . . . (Bad Boy/Arista) — that’s most puzzling. Bad Boy, which for the better part of the late-’90s was hip-hop’s fiscally frivolous House of Bling, has suddenly taken a turn for the gangster. Thug Daddy first emerged last spring with " Let’s Get It, " the debut single of Bad Boy’s new Harlem hope G-Dep. The song features Puffy getting his rap on for the first time in nearly two years, and it’s a hustler’s anthem laced with the sounds of hunger and scheming (as soon as Combs was acquitted, he recut the end of his verse to boast, " Not guilty and I’m filthy, you feel me? " ).

The spartan æsthetic of " Let’s Get It " continues on P. Diddy’s new mission statement, " Bad Boy for Life. " What with former Bad Boy stars Mase following God, Biggie long gone, and Shyne, Bad Boy’s most recent hope for credibility, so real that he’s doing time, Puff must once again recast the sound and vision of his label. And this summer, once again, Bad Boy runs the dancehall. " Ask the clubs/Bad Boy, that’s what’s up, " Diddy boasts, not idly. " If you don’t feel me, that means you can’t touch me/It’s ugly, trust me. " Over blunt-force bass that pops hard and doesn’t shimmy in the slightest (take that, Timbaland and Neptunes!), Puffy does sound truly alive. Of course, it’s not as if his pen begot those passionate words, but don’t worry about whether he writes rhymes. He writes checks.

Indeed, the one constant throughout Combs’s recent legal travails has been the seeming impregnability of his fortune. While still on trial, he launched a huge runway show for his Sean John clothing line. Featuring hard-rock denims alongside demi-couture leathers and suits, the collection garnered wide critical praise. While in the courthouse, Combs made a point of being nattily attired, though he wisely shied away from anything too ostentatious.

Those demure duds were a far cry from Puff’s halcyon days as a human glowstick, an era he self-satirizes on " Shiny Suit Man, " wherein he brags, " I own this $500 million shiny suit, " an oblique reference to the scope of his wealth. These days it’s subtle outfits of distinction for the Grand Prix of Monaco, or standard-issue thugwear for his videos. Puff has always found the midpoint between the two worlds — hey, he brought hip-hop to the Hamptons — but it seems he’s more eager to separate them these days. " I don’t floss no more, " he claims on " The Last Song. " " I drop jewels. "

Nevertheless, you can’t take the playing out of the player, as his recent Miami antics demonstrate. And no matter how deeply Puff retreats to the hardcore, he’ll always end up somewhere in the suburbs, kicking corny rhymes like " It’s a Bentley to you, but to me it’s a blue car. " That pearl of wisdom comes from the Neptunes-produced " Diddy, " which is likely to be the album’s next single. Here Puff outdoes himself, biting Eric B & Rakim, Boogie Down Productions, and Nice & Smooth without even sampling them. Old habits die hard, of course, and the Neptunes, who are so postmodernly post-Puffy that they bite their own production ideas, certainly don’t push Puff into new ground.

But " Diddy " is anomalous for this album. Everywhere else, the new agglomeration of Bad Boy thugs spit gruff verse while Puff mugs for the camera. With " Let’s Get It " and " Bad Boy for Life " as anchors, The Saga Continues . . . has become the official, perhaps inadvertent, hardcore hip-hop album of the summer. It’s yet another strategy of reinvention from the true Teflon don: signing more fresh blood, sensing the demise of the style he founded and running from it (someone call Jay-Z), keeping the dance floors rumbling. " It’s official/I survived what I been through, " he boasts on " Bad Boy for Life, " Y’all got drama?/The saga continues . . .  " Does it ever.