Though Sandy Carroll's new release is marketed as blues, it is more rinsed than soaked in the genre. It draws in backing musicians from Memphis and Muscle Shoals, along with notables Johnny Rawls and Bernard Allison (and, I note, on one cut the late Sid Selvidge, who was a favorite of mine).

In my hearing Blues & Angels has more the sound of the mainstream pop-rock that dominated the charts half a century ago. From the larger perspective afforded by the intervening decades, the style's reappearance generates a recognition of rootedness borne by a 21st-century appreciation of the traditions -- r&b, gospel, vintage pop -- that shaped the style. This strain has long since been pushed to the sidelines of non-Nashville pop. Still, a form of it survives in what passes for country. Happily, Carroll does not pose as country, which means we're spared the empty, faux-authenticating gesture of fiddle and steel dropped into the mix.

Each of the songs is an original by keyboardist Carroll working in collaboration with somebody else. The material is capably crafted, and Carroll is a soulful (and tastefully restrained) vocalist. If her voice were a drink, it would be a smooth, pleasurable whiskey. If the album has a theme, it's suffering, healing and the capacity for joy amid life's vicissitudes. Carroll delivers maturity and grace, not vapid self-help cliches, to the enterprise.

Cary Morin's music, played mostly on acoustic (though occasionally electric) guitar, comes from a deep place. It's a rich synthesis of folk, jazz, blues, pop and rock, all absorbed and fused into a remarkable personal style. He can sing, too. Born in Montana as a member of the Crow tribe, currently residing in Fort Collins, Colorado, he is -- as so many of America's finest musicians are -- better known in Europe than here. I hope When I Rise does something to wake his fellow citizens from their slumber.

"Try to remember it's only one guitar," David Bromberg, who knows something about the instrument himself, says of Morin's picking. An enormous amount of music, in other words, is welling up out of that instrument. Even a non-musician like me can only wonder how a guitar can be made to sound so nearly orchestral. Vocally, Morin gives the impression of a more intense James Taylor. Yet overall he is less a Taylor acolyte than a master who drew different lessons from the sources who influenced Taylor.

Though the bulk of the cuts are originals, Morin covers a couple of rock numbers, including Duane Allman's "Little Martha." I haven't heard the original to the best of my recollection, so I have nothing to compare it to. I have no doubt, though, that Morin shapes it to his own distinctive approach. I do know "Dire Wolf," written by Robert Hunter and Jerry Garcia for the Grateful Dead in the manner of a traditional murder ballad. I like the Dead's version, but in good part because he's a stronger singer with a more inventive arrangement to show, Morin elevates its power. (The dire wolf, by the way, was a giant prehistoric dog.)

The title song, a Morin concoction, is a particularly compelling cut. Nothing in the rest of the program is much like it, but it definitely spins on in the head long after the disc has gone silent.