By Edna Gundersen, Steve Jones, Elysa Gardner and Brian Mansfield, USA TODAY
Lucinda Williams, Blessed
* * * (out of four) AMERICANA
By James Minchin III
Lucinda Williams is out with her first album since 2008.
By James Minchin III
Lucinda Williams is out with her first album since 2008.
After delivering such artistic triumphs as 1992's Sweet Old World and 1998's Car Wheels on a Gravel Road, Lucinda Williams could have spent years struggling with the familiar career curse of competing against her past.
At 58, the Southern singer is in peak form. Her songwriting has only sharpened over time. The years have added grit to a soulful, sandpapery voice, enhancing the vehicle for her bluesy, countrified, heartache-drenched tunes. Her undiminished abilities to spin a story, sling a venomous line and craft a gorgeous melody are amply evident on Blessed, her 10th album and her first since 2008's Little Honey.
In 12 new songs, Williams' wisdom, emotional depth and evocative language shine through. Co-produced by Don Was, who shares Williams' taste for a rootsy simplicity, Blessed opens with the stinging kiss-off Buttercup and ends on the moving Kiss Like Your Kiss, bookends that underscore her emotional range. In between are powerful tunes that address love strained by war (Soldier's Song), the suicide of friend Vic Chesnutt (Seeing Black) and romantic webs. ? Edna Gundersen
>Download:Soldier's Song, The Awakening, Kiss Like Your Kiss, To Be Loved, Seeing Black
OTHER NOTABLE RELEASES:
Marsha Ambrosius, Late Nights & Early Mornings
* * * � R&B
Ambrosius' solo debut has been anticipated since she and Floetry partner Natalie Stewart split four years ago. She doesn't disappoint. Whether she's slyly coming on to a guy or ruing his departure, her lyrics are expressive and witty, and her singing is passionate. Hope She Cheats on You (With a Basketball Player) finds a jilted lover wishing her ex's new girlfriend brings him bad luck. Far Away mourns a lost friend, while The Break Up Song is a litany of regret. ? Steve Jones
>Download:�Above tracks, Tears, Your Hands
Ron Sexsmith, Long Player Late Bloomer
* * * � POP
Anyone who feared that Metallica and M�tley Cr�e producer Bob Rock might try to turn Sexsmith into a headbanger can rest easy. Long Player is the Canadian troubadour's most fully realized pop album yet, offering graceful arrangements that make the tunes shine without burying their folk roots. Sexsmith's songcraft is at the fore ? tenderly expressive without stooping to sentimentality. ? Elysa Gardner
>Download:Believe It When I See It, Michael and His Dad
Francesca Battistelli, Hundred More Years
* * * � CHRISTIAN POP
Young, single women connected so deeply with Battistelli's 2008's My Paper Heart that they made her Christian music's biggest-selling new act in years. Now married and with an infant son, Battistelli is writing about new life stages. Breezy single This Is the Stuff tries to take an optimistic outlook on everyday annoyances, but by the time the album closes with Worth It and Hundred More Years, she's taking eloquent long-range views on love and family. ? Brian Mansfield
>Download:�Above tracks, Emily (It's Love)
Dropkick Murphys, Going Out in Style
* * * CELTIC PUNK ROCK
On its seventh studio album, the Boston band continues waving twin flags of revelry and revolution, hosting a raucous barroom party while whipping up fervor for organized labor and other social causes. Much of Style stems from the band's family histories, compressed into the struggle of fictional character Cornelius Larkin. The tales are funny, moving, inspiring and, above all, entertaining. ? Edna Gundersen
>Download:�Memorial Day, The Hardest Mile
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