When I last encountered her -- I mean via CD, of course, not in person -- I recall thinking Amy McCarley bore a strong resemblance to a young Loretta Lynn. (See my review of her Jet Engines in this space on 26 July 2014.) Her vocals bore the accent of her native Alabama as Lynn's did (still do, for that matter) of her Kentucky roots. McCarley's writing, however, found shape in a lean 21st-century sensibility, rather more worldly than the mainstream version.

This time around, the more fully produced MECO will bring Lucinda Williams to mind. I can attest to that because immediately after hearing MECO for the first time I put Williams' The Ghosts of Highway 20 on the player. McCarley and Williams are striking singers, though the former is more straightforward while Williams indulges in a drawl that sometimes feels a bit labored (or maybe just when I'm in an irritable mood; I am a fan). Half a century ago, both would have been folk singers. Today, rock is at or near the center of what they do. Williams' rock is shaded by blues and folk, McCarley's by country.

Their songwriting is grounded, too, in personal experience, which in lesser hands (and yes, most are lesser) could have tried patience. Where Williams' lyric style is poetic (her father was the late poet Miller Williams), McCarley's is conversational, disinclined to render Big Statements in favor of plain-spoken confrontation and complaint ("How You Do" being a particularly compelling example). Her overall approach, if sharp-edged, is never less than sympathy-inducing, thanks to its adult way of processing romantic disappointment and discontent. In other words, pointed but without crippling anger or melodrama.

When I wrote about her previous release, I noted a certain absence of humor. I'm sure that had nothing to do with her decision to write (with Pat Alger) the John Prine-like "Ain't Life Funny," which contains the line "you don't know how to tell a joke." No, it isn't exactly funny, but it is rueful and slyly self-mocking and a stand-out cut.

Kenny Vaughan and George Bradfute return from last time to oversee production. Vaughan, who is lead guitarist in Marty Stuart's Fabulous Superlatives, is present on each cut. Stuart and fellow Superlative Harry Stinson show up separately on a number apiece, while the gifted multi-instrumentalist Chris Scruggs is all over the place. Bradfute contributes slide guitar to "Clarksdale Blues," which -- oddly -- is not a blues, his instrument and that Mississippi town's long association with Delta blues notwithstanding. Even so, like everything else here, an appealing song from an artist already standing above most in the current crop of singer-songwriters.

MECO stands for "Main Engine Cut Off," by the way. It's a NASA acronym known to McCarley because she worked for the agency before she set off on a singing career.