Musgraves branches out but retains country roots

B+ Kacey Musgraves Golden Hour MCA

Kacey Musgraves made inroads in the last decade as a country upstart with earthiness and wit. She tied together the genre’s traditions with pithy, observant lyrics about small-town life.

On Golden Hour, the singer-songwriter has made a style-hopping album that infuses her songs with a relaxed spaciousness while muting, but not ignoring, her country roots.

Even as a banjo percolates in the background of “Slow Burn,” a sense of wonderment prevails amid loping dreaminess, evoking

Harvest-era Neil Young. There’s a mission statement, all the more potent because she delivers it with calm resolve: “I’m gonna do it my way, it’ll be alright/ If we burn it down and it takes all night.”

This sly country rebel’s boldness is still couched in solid, fairly traditional verse-chorus song craft, with detours aplenty. “Oh, What a World,” kicks in with vocodor-enhanced vocals and gives the twangy accouterments a spacey glow. “Lonely Weekend” underlines the chill-out atmosphere with Caribbean accents and echoes of Rumours-era Fleetwood Mac. On “Love Is a Wild Thing,” she’s unafraid to show the small cracks of yearning in her voice and turns a potentially cliched sentiment into something far more potent. But “Wonder Woman” and “Velvet Elvis” drag the album toward assembly-line country-pop.

Musgraves is best when she upends convention. The sassy “High Horse” is dressed up with a strutting disco bass line. Some change-ups are more subtle, notably “Rainbow.” An impressionistic piano ballad, it drapes its tale of resilience in the symbolic colors of the LGBT pride flag. Like much of Golden Hour, its warmth masks its defiant, subversive edge.

Hot tracks: “High Horse,” “Slow Burn,” “Lonely Weekend” — GREG KOT Chicago Tribune (TNS)

A Bettye LaVette Things Have Changed Verve

Fierce. Fearless. Bold. Singer Bettye LaVette has these qualities in abundance and puts them to good use on Things Have Changed, her new album of 12 mostly lesser-well-known Bob Dylan songs.

The soulful rhythm and blues singer is a powerhouse who grasps the foundation of these songs and gives each a distinctive and intelligent vocal. LaVette sings with confidence and knowing; she gives Dylan’s lyrics the thought and attention they deserve, setting some ablaze with passion and others smoul-

dering with emotion. In the transformative process, she finds unexpected emotional depths.

LaVette’s interpretive gifts are on brilliant display, especially on the yearning, vulnerable “Emotionally Yours.” Her pain is raw and anguished on “Don’t Fall Apart on Me Tonight,” while her spin on “It Ain’t Me Babe” is slower — a sad farewell aching with deep regret. On “Seeing the Real You at Last,” her voice bites, enhancing the song’s bitterness. “Going Going Gone” is haunting and moody,

one of LaVette’s best vocals ever. “The Times They Are A-Changin’” takes on a timely relevance in her delivery.

She and the musicians — producer Steve Jordan on drums, former Dylan sideman Larry Campbell on guitar, Pino Palladino on bass and Leon Pendarvis on keyboards — are in synch, giving the singer and the songs strong and lean support. Guests include Keith Richards, Ivan Neville and Trombone Shorty.

LaVette’s career started in the early 1960s in Detroit. She had a couple of Top 10 R&B hits, but did not reach a consistent stardom until the 2005 release of I’ve Got My Own Hell to Raise, which was loaded with stunning covers such as Lucinda Williams’ “Joy,” Sinead O’Connor’s “I Do Not Want What I Have Not Got” and Dolly Parton’s “Little Sparrow.”

With Things Have Changed, LaVette cements her place in American popular music as one of its finest interpreters.

Hot tracks: all, but especially “Going Going Gone,” “Emotionally Yours,” “Don’t Fall Apart on Me Tonight” — ELLIS WIDNER Arkansas Democrat-Gazette

A- Kim Richey Edgeland Yep Roc

From the delicious opening guitar lick on “The Red Line,” a deceptively simple song about a ride on Chicago’s “L” train, singer-songwriter Kim Richey shows off

her ability to turn mundane details into A-level song craft. The song lifts an ordinary train ride into art. She puts listeners on the train beside her, although it feels as if she’s alone there, lost in thought and discerning observation.

Richey sustains that level of craftsmanship through a dozen new songs, including collaborations with Chuck Prophet, Robyn Hitchcock, Mike Henderson and other Nashville mainstays. Her old-soul singing conveys sadness and energy all at once.

Those who know Richey’s work will find fresh magic here — songs like “Pin a Rose,” a ballad about lending a sympathetic ear to a heartbroken friend, and “Can’t Let You Go,” another moving Richey anthem. Throughout it all, she matches surprising twists of melody to lyrics that bring fresh wonder to age-old subjects.

For those unfamiliar with Richey’s impressive body of work, Edgeland invites a deeper listen. If it inspires a journey through her entire catalog, that will be a ride worth taking.

Hot tracks: “The Red Line,” “Pin a Rose,” “Can’t Let You Go”