POP/ROCK: John Hiatt, "Dirty Jeans and Mudslide Hymns" (New West)

"I got me a deuce and a quarter, babe / She will ride you right," Hiatt boasts on "Detroit Made," singing of General Motors' Buick Electra 225. The celebration of automotive style, craftsmanship and durability is fitting, as these qualities continue to mark the work of the 58-year-old Indiana-born singer/songwriter.

"Dirty Jeans and Mudslide Hymns" shows Hiatt's muse to be as sharp as ever. Amid another earthy amalgam of rock, soul, blues and country, Hiatt still writes about restless, haunted and on-the-edge souls with the penetrating power of someone who's been there. ("Have you ever been broken, really broken?" he asks on "All the Way Under.") "Down Around My Place," meanwhile, sounds like an allegorical State of the Union that's dark and foreboding. But "I Love That Girl" is unabashedly upbeat, and the somber remembrance of 9/11 that closes the album, "When New York Had Its Heart Broke," ends on a note of stubborn resilience. It's a trait that applies to many of the characters here -- and to the artist himself.

  • NICK CRISTIANO, PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER

POP/ROCK: Fountains of Wayne, "Sky Full of Holes" (Yep Roc)

Wise guys with flashes of empathy: That's Chris Collingwood and Adam Schlesinger, who are Fountains of Wayne. Since 1996, they've been writing finely observed, neatly rhymed character studies set to sleekly produced pop-rock. The songs here cut back on smirking.

"Action Hero" starts out with a Walter Mitty-like family man having dinner with the kids at a small Vietnamese place, and the chiming, heroic music sounds like easy irony. Then it turns out the man is getting bad news from his hospital tests, and his fantasies about "racing against time" to save the world turn poignant.

There's comedy, too. Perpetually deluded hipster entrepreneurs "Richie and Ruben" invest in a boutique called Debris that can't sell a ripped, stained $1,100 T-shirt.

Fountains of Wayne's music has its heart in the 1970s of the Eagles, Bruce Springsteen and Nick Lowe, full of strummed acoustic and electric guitars, repeated octaves on the piano and wordless vocal-harmony choruses. Collingwood's nasal lead vocals can't help sounding twerpy and a little sarcastic.

But this CD warms up to its characters. In "Hate to See You Like This," the singer tries to revitalize a clinically depressed girl. And even if Collingwood and Schlesinger can't resist a couplet as neat as "Let's get your phone reconnected/Let's get this room disinfected," it also sounds as if they care about the people.

  • JON PARELES, NEW YORK TIMES

POP/ROCK: Richard Buckner, "Our Blood" (Merge)

Buckner has a polarizing voice. But while his gristled vocals are an acquired taste, his songs are universally likable. Sure, he's a cult hero with an underground following that adores his '90s output, but after a very rough couple of years, Buckner is back with the brawny, yet modest, "Our Blood."

He is in fine form. On tracks such as "Escape," he's as meditative as usual, capturing poetic pictures via his jagged, uneven singing. "Confession" is a straightforward, driving song that gives Buckner plenty of room to weave a story that resides somewhere between the worlds of country, folk and rock.

  • RICARDO BACA, DENVER POST