Alejandro Escovedo

I've always been vaguely suspicious of alt-country. It's probably because alternative music had its roots in postpunk acts like Gang of Four and the Pop Group, where a whole new rhythmic language was finally invented by the white boys who up until that point had been firmly in thrall to r&b rhythms. So, on one side, you have a music that is rooted in upsetting tradition?and on the other, George Jones.

All the white-boy indie bands seem far more concerned with some nebulous New York City- or Chicago-based notion of "cool" than with emotion, whereas country music often seems too pressed to prove its credentials on the other side: heartbreak, divorce, car wrecks and God. Tiny minutiae versus broad sweeps of the brush; it's an odd juxtaposition. Alejandro Escovedo personifies this strange crossover better than most. He was in the Nuns, the negligible punk band that supported the Sex Pistols on their final date; he has family connections with members of Santana and Prince's bands; he cofounded the cow-punk band Rank and File long before neo-country became fashionable, in 1979. Escovedo has also been responsible for fine, longing, regretful, redemptive?all the country traits, in other words?solo albums that led to bible (of sorts) No Depression naming him alt-country artist of the last decade.

That's a good call. Yet would you buy a country album that features two members of Superchunk? A Man Under the Influence welcomes the approach of old age (Escovedo is in his mid 50s) with a resigned watchfulness usually more associated with politicians. The album is all regret this and regret that, nostalgia for the past here, cello underplaying a mournful lament for old wedding days there. There's none of the naive delight either Waits or Howe Gelb manifests experimenting around with new sounds and ways of expression: the music here has been heard a thousand times before, from Eric Heywood (Freakwater)'s lachrymose pedal steel to the smoky backing vocals and keyboards on "Velvet Guitar." As Escovedo admits openly on the final track, the?yes, you guessed it?melancholy blues of "About This Love," "It's all about this love/It's all about this pain/It's all about the loss/We take to live again."

Yet this isn't a bad or dull album, far from it. Emotions painted in such generous colors always resonate, and Escovedo has a certain timbre and lilt in his voice, plus a clutch of genuine classics ("Rosalie," "Rhapsody") that given the right climate and marketing push could yet see him threaten far less talented peers in the race for sales. Not that that seems to be a motivating factor. "Rhapsody," in particular, has a killer sliding minor-key sequence that I'm sure will soundtrack many a bittersweet drinking session. The old punk has retained enough fire in the belly, even while tending his chickens and kids and dreaming of old Bob Wills records, to carry off this sort of maudlin romance with conviction, and convince he does.