Of all the CDs that find their way to my front porch in hopes of a review at Rambles.NET, the largest number are by singer-songwriters, usually ones I have never heard of. That's because (1) not being an especial fan of the genre, I haven't particularly educated myself; (2) many or most have nothing interesting to say, the reason being that their principal subject is themselves; and (3) I like my music rooted, and by that I don't mean solely in the work of other singer-songwriters. I endorse Bob Dylan's dictum that if you want to write songs, start by listening to traditional ones. Even some who call themselves folk singers these days don't seem to know anything about actual folk songs. It shows.

Still, I try to give them all a chance, even if only in partial listenings, and I am sometimes pleasantly surprised, and once in a while more than that (e.g., Chuck Hawthorne's Fire Out of Stone, which I reviewed here on 22 June 2019). Each of the three discs noted here boasts its own personality, and each owes something, directly or indirectly, to folk tradition even if not featuring a single traditional number.

New to me but not to the recording studio (Bounty, I read here, is his fifth release; his first appeared in 1998), Bill Bloomer offers up a biography it is unlikely anybody else can hope to match: Buddhist monk in Thailand, organic farmer in France, cowboy in both the American West and the Australian Outback, environmentalist, international performer. For our immediate purpose, however, he is the link between Woody Guthrie and the guy who woke up hungover one morning on the desert floor with a mouthful of marbles and no idea how he got there. After Bloomer opened for him, Ramblin' Jack Elliott allowed as how "I never heard anyone sing like that," which given Elliott's long history and own eccentric vocals is an assessment not to be shrugged off casually.

I think, though, that Bloomer brings to mind a Tom Waits and Michael Hurley if the two had been fused into a single entity. In other words, growly, boozy melodies combined with lyrics that never put anything quite the way you expect them to. Because they're not always easy to discern -- many barely crawl their way out of Bloomer's throat -- I am only advancing an opinion when I suggest they're related thematically by reflections of a complicated romantic relationship in which a couple can neither abandon nor get along with one another. That story covers many classic country songs, but this isn't country music, anyway as understood in this particular universe. Bloomer's words feel almost improvised, but I suppose what that means is that they are meticulously crafted to appear that way.

In any event, the songs, which sort of demand repeated listenings, carry more nutrients than the usual singer-songwriter gruel. I am particularly partial to "Banks of Banglampoo," which perhaps owes something to the lovely English folksong "Coast of Malabar." Banglampoo, by the way, is a district in Bangkok.

Chris and Adam Carroll followed separate careers before marrying in 2013, then playing on the same stages on their own until uniting their talents into a duo. Good Farmer is their first couple album, a live-in-the-studio effort produced by the always light-of-touch Lloyd Maines, who also contributes various instruments.

"Good-natured" is the adjective that best fits Farmer, whose most audible influences are Townes Van Zandt and Guy Clark, who pioneered the enduring school of Texas singer-songwriter folk. Though Adam is Texan, Chris grew up in Canada and before moving south performed there with bands and as a solo act. The songs are uniformly likable, if never as ambitious as Van Zandt's and Clark's. The searching confessional "Angel in God's Country" (written by Chris with Michael O'Connor) gives introspective songs a good name, not easily accomplished. Thematically more far-reaching than most of the other cuts (generally about the Carrolls and their social circle; your interest in that subject may vary), Adam's "Ocean of Peace" wishes healing upon all the wounds human beings suffer, without ever lapsing into icky sentimentality. That's not easily done either.

Charlie Roth grew up in a small town just up the road from the small town where I live. Both lie on the far edge of Minnesota; you can't drive west of either without finding yourself in South Dakota before you know it. He now resides in St. Cloud, a college town in the central part of the state. I have a very slight personal acquaintanceship with him, just enough to know (1) we both favor Ian Tyson's great "Summer Wages" and (2) we have local friends in common. I have seen him perform on a few occasions in area venues.

Though he writes some of his own material, Roth is not to be defined precisely as a singer-songwriter. Both his live shows and his albums, including I'm the Smile, highlight intelligently chosen songs from other composers, both relatively known and deeply obscure. He writes often (as here) on domestic contentments, and he does so ably for the most part; in other words, he spares you sugar shock. Still, a little of that goes a long way, and I suspect no one outside his family would ask for more. Roth endears himself to the listener with his inclusion, as the penultimate cut, of the subversive, ruefully honest "Yankee Dime" (written by Effron White) concerning the private temptations and steamy memories that lurk unspoken within even happy marriages.

Recorded in Texas, I'm the Smile brings in some notable names, most prominently Maines, Ray Bonneville, Bill Kirchen and Redd Volkaert. Roth produces with John Inmon, conjuring up a fuller sound than on earlier Roth releases. On occasion the production threatens to crowd out the song. Personally, I could have done without the strings that clutter some cuts, for instance the otherwise excellent Roth composition "Serenity."

Overall, however, this album stays strong and consistent. It boasts songs you'll want to drop into the psychic jukebox: the Van Zandt-like "Gloves" from George Ensle and Chuck Hawthorne; Roth's own "Say Never," with its imaginative turning of the folksong "Reuben's Train" (or at least its ghost) into a meditation on temporal, as opposed to spatial, distance; and Jonathan Byrd's chilling "Clean," about the chaos of drug addiction. Paradoxically, the last, its topic unlike any other on Smile, manages for all its grimness to be a happy surprise.