The Bagel And The Rat

Big pile o’ CDs. Can’t see over it. Good part: nobody can tell I’m here. Anyway this week a bunch of quickie reviews. Using sentence fragments. Dive in!

The Milwaukees, American Anthems Vol. 1

Solid, well-written new Jersey rock with a late 70s/early 80s sensibility and a vocalist, Dylan St. Clark, whose upper register sounds like Huey Lewis. Hard-rocking guitar licks and sprawl. Rocker tunes characterized by a certain melodic monotony, St. Clark using only one mode: shout-it-out passion at the top of his lungs. Fortunately also a variety of gentler songs where he shows range, plus “Save Me.” Suspect these guys are very good live. Hear extended clips here.

Diego Sandrin, A Fine Day Between Addictions

Italian, but sung in English, European pop-dramatic flair and gentle glam crossed with shy form of American alt-rock baritone ice. First song didn’t grab me – seemingly gratuitious profanity, for one thing. Plainspoken, mostly uninflected, vaguely yearning singing seemed too unemotional. All made sense later in the context of the whole CD’s disillusioned focus: “All I can be is this hole that you see / And I’m over your pitiful wall…” sings Sandrin in “My American Friend,” “…your god must be a banker, an accountant, / A brand on your shoes / I’m strung out again / It’s this godawful wind / I wrote ‘motherfucker’ on your wall / And I can’t wait till you cast me out.”

Zinger choruses rubbed in moody, mod grit. Quietly bracing, especially to listen in the morning, like a splash of bay rum on the hot old face. Song titles like “From Music to Nothing,” “Lest I Find Some Dissonance,” and “Pigeons” sum it up. Italian yet somehow New York. Nick Drake fans will probably like too. Listen and buy.

David Pavia, Songs for Soft Machines

Raw crunchy album rock inspired by psychedelia and Stones, classic Strat sound. Voice a high keen like a subset of Jimmy Page’s, sometimes early Mellencamp, or a Black Crowes or ZZ Top howl: can get a bit tedious, but powerful in best rockers like “Here We Go Again,” “Love Is All Over Me,” “Come To Life.” Not so much in some of ballads. But still like them.

Unexpectedly soulful but grokkable lyrics. A very assured debut; a keeper. Listen and buy.

Beth Hirsch, Wholehearted

Soothing jazzy pop. Is much soothing jazzy pop in world. Here more.

Much keyboard. Also some well played guitar work and well planned strings. Also a touch of folk-rock sheen in the writing and eerie throbbing ecto-electronica.

Bored me in the late afternoon. Listened again next morning, found it quite… soothing. Voice like velour. Chord changes like a lava lamp.

A subtle record. A mood record, a time of day record. Be soothed.

Built By Snow, Noise

Not a subtle record.

Gotta be honest with you – I popped this in only because of the cool cover design. Seven-song EP inside not too bad either. Emotional-mechanical. Stuffy-nosed singer sounds like Ric Ocasek (but sometimes overdoes I-don’t-care’-how-yucky-I-sound attitude).

Analog synths!

First two songs are best, “Sleeping Machines” also good. “Juliana” an effective punky ballad. Still – synth-rock style calls for raising of overall songwriting level. Can these guys do it?

Hear. Buy.

Jarez, To the Top

Innocuous smooth jazz and funk-lite from an accomplished saxman. Title track cops the horn hook from the Stones’s “Bitch.”

Jarez toured with his cousin, the rapper Coolio, so he knows some stuff, I guess. But his smooth jazz is worlds better than his ashen r&b.

Sample and buy.

Melissa Giges, Far Beyond the Pacific

Warm, sensitive, jazzy chamber pop with pleasing harmonic motion.
“Surrender” has Bacharach flavor while “Stand By” evokes more jazzy Tori Amos. I dig “Find Some Time” and “Who Will I Be” and the lush ballad “Lay My Head Down” and others.

Good variety of feels and energy levels, but the hooks don’t match the sweet arrangements. Still, above average for the style. If only there weren’t so much of the style around…

Hear and buy at her website.

All done. See you next week, when we return with our regularly scheduled program of complete sentences.

Have you seen the annoying TV commercial where that hideously peppy girl checks her cell phone and sees that her very first paycheck has cleared? If I’ve ever pitied a fictional character, it’s that poor boyfriend of hers as she snaps his neck in her heedlessly peppy embrace.

Roger Hodgson‘s new (and first) concert DVD puts me in mind of that commercial. Not because his songs are unusually happy-sounding, although many of them are, especially some of the hits he wrote with Supertramp. No, it’s because the band’s Breakfast in America was the first album I ever bought with money I’d earned, as opposed to gift or allowance money. That’s not something a guy forgets, even if it doesn’t make him kick his legs and leap into the air like Mary Tyler Moore on PCP.

For those of you only casually familiar with Supertramp, Roger Hodgson was the one with the really high voice. He wrote and sang the majority of the band’s hits as they sold 60 million records worldwide. (For those of you not familiar with Supertramp at all, you can stop reading right here – this DVD will not interest you, and your life has little meaning anyway.)

Many of those hits are included on this set, recorded at a recent Montreal concert with a smiling Hodgson presiding like a beneficent god of peace over an audience of awed middle-agers. (To be fair, some of them have brought their kids, who seem to be enjoying the music too.) Playing keyboards and twelve-string guitar, accompanied only by a sax player (and possibly with the subtle assistance of a Mac laptop, but it’s hard to tell), he comes pretty close to evoking not just the emotional energy but also the spectacular arrangements that made Supertramp one of the biggest bands of the late 1970s.

An Amazon.com reviewer called this a “feel-good” concert in the way certain movies are “feel-good” movies, and I’d have to agree. An artist at the top of his game, an adoring audience, and excellent video and sound editing add up to a concert DVD that should please even picky Supertramp (and Hodgson) fans. Hodgson’s unmistakable voice seems, if anything, to have strengthened since the early days, without losing any of its stratospheric range.

The concert includes most of the best-known songs associated with Supertramp’s glory days: “Take the Long Way Home,” “Sister Moonshine,” “Dreamer,” “Two of Us,” and “Give a Little Bit” (which you youngsters may know from a Gap commercial of a few years ago, or the Red Cross tsuanami relief campaign, or maybe the Goo Goo Dolls cover. And here’s Hodgson doing it with Ringo’s All-Stars in 2000. The list goes on.) Don’t worry, he doesn’t leave out “Breakfast in America” and “The Logical Song.”

Hodgson also does several songs from his solo efforts, including “Lovers in the Wind” and “Love is a Thousand Times.” Yes, there’s a lot of love in these songs, and a whole carnival of it in the concert hall. Man, do they love him in Canada!

Fans will probably think of a song or two they wish he’d done. He doesn’t do two of my favorites, “Lady” and “Babaji.” But this is a concert DVD, not a greatest hits collection (or a “Sobel’s favorites” collection, for that matter).

There are a few short clips from a different concert in an entirely different format: with a full orchestra and full band. Bits from “Even in the Quietest Moments” and “Fool’s Overture” are notable. Many dinosaur rock acts have tried out the orchestral thing, from the Moody Blues to Metallica, with varying success. Supertramp’s music was pretty heavily – and very carefully – orchestrated, so these pieces work well and one wishes they were complete songs.

The extras also include some fan interview footage and a little more soundcheck and backstage action than necessary. The latter show Hodgson to be an exacting musical director, but generous and appreciative when greeting fans and friends. More interesting are the two short interviews, where he discusses his creative process, how he “was always a solo artist within a band,” the sound of the twelve-string guitar, and a little about his charity work. The details about how and when he wrote some of the biggest hits will interest fans. “My songs are as alive for me today as the day I wrote them,” he says. That’s got to be a key attribute for any popular artist who wants to maintain a career over decades, and you can tell from the performances here that he means it when he says it.

Technically, the concert is smoothly recorded and edited, the sound is high quality, and the authoring is fine. Having already gone double platinum in Canada, this DVD should please American fans just as much. Total running time: 140 minutes. Audio options: Dolby Digital Stereo, Dolby Digital 5.1, DTS Surround Sound.

Sam Baker, Pretty World

When Sam Baker was in his early thirties, a terrorist bomb blew up the train he was riding in Peru. Eight died in the attack. Among many other injuries, Baker lost all hearing in one ear and partial hearing in the other. Because of this disability, his gravelly, blurred singing sounds very odd, even disturbing at first. But a couple of songs into his marvelous new CD you begin to appreciate the contrast between the ragged, pained sound of his voice and the bright arc of his talent.

The songs are so simply structured they seem naked, and the spare poetry of the lyrics quietly chafes your sensibility until you have to spin back and listen again. Baker sings of the American fringe: a prostitute, an orphan, a gambler, an oilman's ne'er-do-well son, "a woman who puts things in boxes." Using spindly folk idioms and few but choice words, Baker brings his characters to life like the best of Springsteen's creations, or like those of a short story writer such as Raymond Carver.

A few of the songs paint pictures rather than tells tales, but again sparely, with an almost haiku-like feel. In "Sweetly Undone," a man appreciates his lover: "I watch you at the pool / Slowly undress / Spread your towel on St. Augustine / Lay down and rest / Lay down and rest / Lay down in the sun / Lay down with your top / Sweetly undone." The power of the image is found not so much in the visual presence of the woman, but in its incantatory evocation by the poet. One can almost see his feelings as he describes her.

In "Days" the narrator draws a brief picture of women "laughing in the kitchen / Content with the house / Content with the family, / The candles, food, friends / The music / These December days / The shortest of the year / How beautiful they are." But then he goes on to describe "baking bread / Fresh coffee / And for tonight cold Mexican beer…" With just those two extra words, "for tonight," Baker suddenly widens the perspective: this isn't an unending life of domestic happiness but a frozen moment, with the unspoken implication that tomorrow might bring something quite different, maybe something terrible.

If this sounds more like a poetry review than a music review, that's not an accident. There is definitely sweetness in the music, if not in the singing. But without those pinpoint words, the music wouldn't be much more than pretty guitars backing a strange, honking voice singing wayward, halting melodies. If you like Townes Van Zandt and Gillian Welch and John Prine you'll probably like Sam Baker. There, I said it.

Hear some tracks from Pretty World at Sam Baker's Myspace page.

Peter Himmelman, The Pigeons Couldn't Sleep

Veteran rocker Peter Himmelman's latest CD is a concoction of drawling rock, blues, and folk with dark lyrics and a substantial nod to reggae. The ominous title track mixes Chicago blues guitar, reggae bass and keyboards, and vocals that sound like Bob Dylan on a good day. The song is about a relationship gone to hell: "I held out for the best, but then your letter came / I held it in my hand and I nearly died from shame." Why shame? He doesn't say, but we don't need the particulars – it's all in the song's dusky groove.

"Winning Team" is the CD's standout track. Himmelman threads a ska dance beat and Stones-like rock guitar under a catchy, shout-along tune: "I'm a bird-watching fool, my binoculars are clean / But just once I'd like to be on the winning team." Delicious stuff.

Other times the sound reminds one of grim Nick Cave or Lou Reed material, of David Bowie, of Delbert McClinton's blue-eyed soul, or even of Tom Waits, but Himmelman has his very own varieties of the styles he works in: not just smoky gloom but also dry, folksy Americana ("The Ship of Last Hope"), rueful piano balladry ("17 Minutes To 1"), gravelly blues ("Save a Little Honey"), and horn-fed soul musings ("There Comes a Time"), all fed by strong songwriting and smart lyrical phrasings and hooks. "It sure sounded like a good idea at the time." "There comes a time to mend your ways, and that time is now." "I'm never short on distractions, how about you?" Some songs are more memorable than others, and I found myself losing interest during some of the slower ones. But overall I liked the CD quite a lot.

Also included, at least in this early pressing, is a DVD with an hourlong video documentary about Himmelman, including archival footage of his early days with the band Sussman Lawrence (guys he still plays with). "When I was a young man my dreams were all about fame and hair. Now I don't have much of either," he narrates. "But I've got no regrets. I followed my dreams, and they led me here."

Here is really here and there and everywhere: a club tour with his old bandmates, another with an energetic young Israeli band, and some solo acoustic gigs. He talks a little about being an observant Jew and having turned down appearances on the Tonight Show and an opening slot for Rod Stewart because he won't play on the Sabbath. Judaism is about "trying to extract the miraculous from the mundane," he says, and that fits right in with the rest of his philosophy. "What passes for rebellion in rock and roll puts me to sleep," he says. "I was always searching for something far more frightening." Right on, Peter – being a Jew can definitely be frightening. (I'm not saying that's exactly what he meant, of course. But it resonates.)

Despite a perpetual sad mien, Himmelman is funny as sh*t – clowning on stage, making up songs as he goes along, taking a whole audience outside to continue a concert, with acoustic guitars, in a parking lot. Actually, his sad-clown countenance probably makes his antics more funny, and his musical impression of a pompous "rock god" makes Spinal Tap seem tame.

The DVD contains just the documentary, no extras – it itself is the extra. Professionally produced, it sounds and looks and flows very nicely. Don't watch it expecting extended stage performances – is has (with the exception of the rock god improv) only clips. They do give a good feel for the flavor of his songs and his performances, but it might have been nice to see one or two whole songs. Essentially, though, it's a character study in the form of a small road movie, and music aside, Himmelman is a fun character to spend an hour with. Students of rock music and pop culture will also learn a thing or two about life as a professional troubadour. (Himmelman actually supports himself by composing the scores for TV shows such as Judging Amy and Bones.) I found the film very amusing, and modestly enlightening, even though prior to this I had only a vague awareness of Himmelman's music.

Hear MP3s from the new CD here.

Why yet another Fats Domino greatest hits release? Why do record labels keep putting out repackaged versions of the same original recordings? Fats Domino – 50 Greatest Hits appeared in 1999. Fats Domino Jukebox (20 songs) followed in 2002. Now here’s Fats Domino Greatest Hits: Walking To New Orleans, with 30 songs on one CD.

The obvious reason, of course, is that the owner of the recordings – in this case, Capitol Records – wants to keep making money from them. Many superfans and completists will buy a new release even if they’ve got all the tracks elsewhere, while others, who may just now be looking for a greatest-hits set for the first time, will be more attracted to a fresh package even if the material itself is half a century old. But there’s another reason, though it might not be one the label has in mind. Sales aside, a new collection of old songs can generate new artistic and cultural interest in a worthy artist. And when that artist is as essential, and as enjoyable, as Fats Domino, that can only be a good thing.

The new release has as good a selection as most fans could hope for, within the time limits of a single CD, and it’s a very good introduction to Fats for those who don’t know him. Since Domino had more than 30 hits, old-timers might wish one or another had been included that wasn’t, but all the biggies are here, from his breakout boogie “The Fat Man” to his colossal hit “Ain’t That a Shame,” from “Blue Monday” to “My Blue Heaven” to his definitive cover of “Blueberry Hill” (the version Richie Cunningham was always singing on Happy Days), and from “Bo Weevil” and “I’m Gonna Be A Wheel Someday” to “I’m Walkin'” and, of course, “Walking To New Orleans.”

Bill Dahl’s very good liner notes draw heavily from Rick Coleman’s groundbreaking biography Blue Monday, which vividly recounts Domino’s long and eventful life, right up through his dramatic rescue from his flooded home town during Hurricane Katrina. The book established the star’s importance to the history of race relations in mid-20th century America as well as to the development of modern rock and pop, and I need not go into that here. Truth is, Fats’s music, which dominated the charts during the 1950s, is just as enjoyable today. Its happy simplicity and its indomitable beat just won’t get old.

Ain’t that a shame: the new incarnation of WCBS-FM, the venerable New York oldies station, has redefined “oldies” as hits from the 60s, 70s and 80s rather than the 50s and 60s the way it used to be. Since I was born in the 60s, and came of age musically in the 70s, that station, and a similar one in Boston, were the places I learned Fats’s songs and got “Ain’t That a Shame” and “Blueberry Hill” sewn permanently into my own skin. (A painless procedure, I assure you.) People listening to the new CBS won’t get any Fats with their Rod Stewart and their Mamas and the Papas.

Fortunately, they can get this new CD. The price is great and the recordings sound as good as 50-year-old singles can be made to sound on a modern CD. (The very oldest tracks sound a bit worn, but I’m sure that’s because of the limitations of the source media.) On most tracks Domino’s vocals jump out like he just sang them yesterday. His iconic piano triplets chug up your spine, and Herbert Hardesty’s classic sax lines surge out warm and rich. Capitol’s Ron McMaster deserves kudos for a great mastering job. If you’re looking for a single, high quality, more-or-less definitive Fats Domino hits collection, for a very nice price, this is definitely your best bet.

Syndicated through Blogcritics to the Advance.net network and Boston.com.

Corey Harris, Zion Crossroads

Perhaps more than any other artist, Corey Harris has mastered and synthesized the several traditions of African Diaspora music. A roots-music archeologist as much as he is a singer-songwriter and guitarist, Harris always reveals something fundamental about the music even as he puts his own wide-awake stamp on it, whether it’s blues, soul, Afropop or reggae.

Harris’s first Telarc release is a big change from Daily Bread, which came out on Rounder Records two years ago. That album ranged across several styles and traditions, and consisted mostly of humanistic or personal songs. Zion Crossroads on the other hand is almost pure reggae, and highly political. On both counts it’s an exciting set of music.

For an artist writing such socially aware songs, a sense of playfulness is important, to counterbalance the grim state of the world he’s describing and engaging. Harris brings just enough merriment to his writing and recording. Lively beats and melodies animate serious subject matter in “No Peace for the Wicked” (with guest vocals by Ranking Joe), “Keep Your Culture,” and “Afrique (Chez Moi)” – the last sung in fractured French.

High spirits give way to heavier hearts in songs like “Heathen Rage”: “Jah made us to live in a free world/Babylon take it and make it a he world/Leave out the mothers, daughters, and the females/Leave out the blacks and they left out the browns/Make them to build up your cities and towns/Steal their religion and turn them into clowns.” But injustice does not make the songs plod or sound bitter. To my non-African ears, Harris gets the reggae language and lilt down perfectly: “trodding inna Zion/children got to ride on/just like a conquering lion/true true African.” The CD is a worthy addition both to Corey Harris’s discography and to the reggae tradition.

Listen at Myspace and download a free track at the Telarc website.

Jack Foster III, Tame Until Hungry

“There’s no mythology in pain.” From the first lyric on Jack Foster III’s new CD, we can tell we’re not in for everyday prog-rock bombast. These thirteen complex, richly orchestrated songs, sung assuredly in Foster’s thick baritone and stretched high with grand harmonies, mine the varied terrains of hard rock, acoustic music, and melodic progressive rock. At the same time, they’re firmly layered in the deeper tradition of plain old song.

There is even a sense – a modest one – of a lighter touch than that wielded by many progressive-minded artists. “Civilized Dog” swings close to rootsiness, and “One Dark Angel” with its mellow harmonies even flirts with the heartland before devolving into a powerful sax solo (by David Hipshman).

Some of the songs on the second half of the CD get a little preachy, or prosaic. But almost always they’re rescued by a rave-up, a shredfest (though always musical), or a power-funk jam that lifts the song back to the heights of Foster’s best. And the musicianship is masterful throughout, with Foster’s brilliant guitar work joined by Trent Gardner’s keyboards and Robert Berry’s bass and drums. Both are top-notch musicians and veteran producers who’ve worked with big-name acts like Magellan, ELP, Dream Theater and Yes, and both are impeccably good.

Each song is fully imagined, like a well-written fantasy story. Yet, as promised in that initial lyric, they are not weighed down with mythology. This is grown-up, solidly original rock for thinking people.

Sea Dragons, Sea Dragons (EP)

Session guitarist and renaissance man Darryl Thurston formed the Sea Dragons to showcase his sparkly pop songwriting, which is based in the (mostly) happy-go-lucky sounds of the 60s and 70s. Think of the Rolling Stones without the pseudo-Satanic side, with a little George Harrison and bubblegum psychedelia thrown into the pot. “Sweet Delilah” is an obvious but irrestible pop nugget driven by an insistent tambourine, while “Come September” cheerfully evokes the Byrds with biting guitar blasts and close harmonies. “Stop Draggin’ Me Down” could be a lost hit by somebody like Three Dog Night circa 1970, while “Drown” evokes T. Rex. The EP’s introspective moment comes in the pretty love song “Fall Into You.” Each song tickles the pop funnybone in a slightly different way.

Listen at their website or their Myspace page, or purchase at CD Baby.

The States, The Path of Least Resistance

The States have a talent for interesting arrangements, multicolored three-dimensional guitar melodies, and vividly descriptive lyrics. “I spent days drawing up the plan. It was perfect, perfect. You can build where you don’t belong if you’re cautious, cautious,” sings Chris Snyder in “The Architect.” Unfortunately Snyder’s outstanding guitar work outshines his vocals. There are smart, creative minds in this band, excellent musicianship, and lots of parts to like. But pedestrian singing, and reliance on a manufactured sonic bravado that screams “corporate rock,” too often weaken the effect. It doesn’t help that the CD opens with its most derivative (and annoying) song, as if some unsmiling corporate overlord said, “Do one like this so it will sound like everyone else and you can get it on MTV.”

Hear some tracks here.

I get a lot of CDs to review. Many, many CDs.

I mean, really, really a lot of CDs. Piles and piles. Rafts of them. Oodles. Myriads. Hosts.

Did I mention that I get a lot of CDs to review? Well, I do – a lot more than I could possibly give a careful listen to, much less write about. Yet I like to give everything a chance. What to do?

Like many people who work for a living, I have certain tasks that require total concentration, and others whose tedium is ameliorated by background music. So what I often do is throw CDs into my computer while I'm doing the latter kind of work, and see if something jumps out at me in the first couple of songs. If the music can catch my attention at low volume while I'm focused on something else, I figure the disc's worth a careful listen at home later. Usually the test works well.

But it wouldn't have worked for Johnny Irion's new disc, Ex Tempore. This CD is a very subtle set of songs. Fortunately, I'd heard a little about the artist before, through his work with Sarah Lee Guthrie, so I advanced the CD to my serious listening pile even though it hadn't passed the background-music test. The couple of splash moments I'd heard – a Beatles reference here ("Madrid"), a modestly catchy chorus there ("Roman Candle," "Eyes Like a Levee") – hadn't done the trick.

The danger in my method is that I might miss something with a new and original sound that requires close attention in order to "get" what it's about. And what makes Irion's CD special is that it has a new and original sound. Sure, it has influences and recognizable elements: folk-pop, glam rock, blue-eyed soul, Sonny Bono, The Band, and most directly, Neil Young in his wispy-voiced acoustic mode. But taken as a whole, it sounds like nothing else I've heard – a rare and welcome thing.

Irion serves up his topsy-turvy slices of life with grainy, unexpected lyrics and warmly rootsy but slightly off-kilter arrangements. People find their way through life: "I get a good cry every morning/Cuttin' up other people's onions/It's a good way and a good excuse/To let it all out." They philosophize, celebrate, and bemoan: "Casting my net a little wider every day/Somehow the big one always slips away."

But there's much more to it than evocative lyrics. Unlike 99% of pop music, these songs do unexpected things, both sonically and structurally. Imagination dominates. Irion speaks the pop language without using pop formulas. And it all falls together.

Glad I didn't let this one slip away. Listen up at his Myspace page

Anthony Robustelli, Another Fatal Blow

Cross Steely Dan with Stevie Wonder, add some Rufus and a little Randy Newman, and you'll have Anthony Robustelli's new CD. Reveling in its 1970s antecedents in spite of its digital-clean, 21st century home-studio timbre, the music bops and shivers like the best classic jazz-funk, decorated with hints of modern beats and samples.

Robustelli often records his vocals at a relatively low level, increasing the emphasis on his beats, keyboards, and icy electric guitar accents. (He plays most of the instruments himself). The quirky mixing sometimes gives me pause. It's got its own internal logic, I'm sure, but I can't always keep up with it. However, that's a pretty esoteric quibble about a very enjoyable album of well-crafted songs and tasty playing.

Highlights include the catchy "Half a Chance," the swinging, expressionistic "Charismatic Superman," and the soulful ballad "How Do You Say Goodbye," which seems to channel Leon Russell. An easygoing Southern soul vibe makes "Another Rant" a winner, and a brilliant sax solo by Deji Coker helps flesh out the sixteen-minute epic "And When We Tell You."

Listen here, and if you're in the New York area catch him at Biscuit BBQ on October 5. Live, the Robustelli band seriously smokes.

Various Artists, Americana

A few months back I had the opportunity to review Putumayo World Music's Women of the World Acoustic compilation. Now comes their Americana disc, wrapped in the label's usual beautiful packaging, and compiled with care to present some of the most representative artists and songs in the Americana genre. "From Austin to Asheville," reads the back-cover copy, "contemporary singer-songwriters explore America's rural musical roots." True that.

The disc opens with the brisk "Down the Mountain" by the chirpy RobinElla, and proceeds through a batch of woody, non-threatening tunes from the likes of Mulehead, the Little Willies (the Norah Jones-Richard Julian project), and Robert Earl Keen, whose settle-in-and-take-a-nice-bath voice is always welcome. Newcomer Eliza Lynn introduces a jazzy element with the bland "Sing a New Song," and then Old Crow Medicine Show picks up the pace with their sparkly-eyed, high-lonesome, absurdly catchy "Wagon Wheel," from their self-titled debut – which, incidentally, is one of the very few Americana CDs your humble correspondent has actually shelled out money for in the past couple of years. (In case that means anything to you.)

Chip Taylor & Carrie Rodriguez's danceable "Sweet Tequila Blues" makes you feel like you're at a barn dance. Taylor, the legendary songwriter of "Wild Thing" and "Angel of the Morning," is enjoying a rejuvenated career as part of this duo.

An exception to the album's theme of original songs in old-fashioned styles is new grass legend Tim O'Brien's stubbornly, and refreshingly, traditional arrangement of "House of the Rising Son." Alison Brown's gently virtuosic instrumental "Deep Gap" leads into the gospel-like and utterly charming "Prayer For My Friends" by Terri Hendrix, which is that rarity, a song about praying that doesn't annoy me.

I don't get Josh Ritter's appeal, but he's popular and he's here. Ruthie Foster – whose CD Runaway Soul I also bought with my own money – closes the disc. Foster can teach us all a thing or two about injecting soul into an acoustic arrangement.

The abiding impression one gets from this CD is "pretty, but safe." Nothing wrong with that – the collection is very pleasant and does what it sets out to do. If you don't listen to this kind of music much, it could certainly turn you on to some fine artists.

Shea Breaux Wells, Piece of the Light

Shea Breaux Wells mixes up torchy jazz and contemporary piano pop, but she seems more inspired, both as a singer and a songwriter, in the former language. Her strength as a vocalist is in the fine points of melodic movement called for by jazz chords; her voice doesn't have the bright colors needed for pop, and the songs she writes in the latter style are tame and prone to prosaic, new-agey lyrics. The pulsing "The Keeper" is something of an exception.

I would have enjoyed a whole album of the jazzier songs like "Soothe Me," "Finest of Lies," her snaky version of "Always Something There to Remind Me," and her re-imagining of the Beatles' "Blackbird," in which her velvety voice cushions an exciting piano solo from Noam Lemish.

Listen at her website or at CD Baby.