NEW ON CD

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Rosanne Cash strikes
gold on newest CD

"Rules of Travel" Rosanne Cash Capitol

By Gary C.W. Chun
gchun@starbulletin.com

To echo the opinions of others on Rosanne Cash -- yes, this is one of the best albums of the year (and a serious contender for album of the year, in my book) and, yes, it is the best of her career. The songwriting on this album combines her earlier strengths as a premiere country artist in Nashville to the more sophisticated songstyling she's developed as a storywriter in her adopted home of New York City. Her warm and lustrous singing voice is the strongest it's ever been, and all of this makes for an incredibly powerful listening experience.

With the exception of the prayerful "Western Wall," originally released back in 1996 on her "10 Song Demo" album and reworked for "Rules of Travel," everything else is new. While the bulk of songs were written either by Cash herself or with her producer-husband John Leventhal, a couple of offerings from outside writers are noteworthy. The opening "Beautiful Pain," with harmony vocals by Sheryl Crow, is just what the title says, and "Hope Against Hope," written by Joe Henry and the Wallflowers' Jakob Dylan, is a vivid portrait of lost love never to be regained.

The kinds of love that Cash addresses, while rueful in memory because of its failings, are used to strengthen and mature her characters. "I'll Change for You" (a duet with maverick Steve Earle) and "Closer Than I Appear" are particularly fine examples of that, both reminiscent of her earlier country work.

The album's title track, cowritten with Leventhal, is a glorious and expansive-sounding piece with a great chorus. And her affecting duet with her ailing father Johnny on "September When It Comes," where pater familias and daughter sing about mortality, is a poignant heartbreaker.

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