You might say Rod Picott is an acquired taste, but I can't swear to that from my own personal experience. The first time I heard him perform, on a Nashville-based television special highlighting the would-be genre of Americana, I was impressed. It helped that I recognized where he was coming from: the folk-influenced songwriting that emerged in the mid-1960s and, a bit more distantly, the blue-collar themes that comprised hard-hitting country laments of another era.

That doesn't make Picott a relic exactly, because his songs and his approach seem at once in and out of time. The world he conjures up was here well before us and will be here long after us: defined by economic hardship, fractured families, shaky relationships, dark roads and streets, the persistence of hope in defiance of experience. In common with other singer-songwriters. Picott's compositions are inner-looking; unlike many of the more insufferable practitioners, though, they are just as linked with everyone and everything in the surrounding social arrangement. The source of his characters' despair, in short, is usually deeper than a romantic breakup.

In Paper Hearts & Broken Arrows, as in his other albums, the singing, the melodies and the arrangements are never fancy. You may even wonder if the narrator has a headache, powered by existential stress, not prepared for the complication of anything like the ordinary sweetening and catchy tunes by which pop music drives ear worms into our brains. Yet, as with Bruce Springsteen's beloved Nebraska from four decades ago, Picott captures an austere beauty in scenes taken from capitalism's other side. Picott actually seems to be playing down the idea that these are songs. Sometimes they could be just a man talking to himself. We only happen to be there overhearing him as his thoughts tumble out of mouth and heart.

At the same time the powerful "Frankie Lee" makes an audible bow to Woody Guthrie without resorting to imitation. If Woody were around, I suspect he would have been proud to be its composer.

That said, I now clear my throat to offer this perhaps startling observation:

For human-sized music scattered about us and available for comfort, observation and truth-telling, I'd take Rod Picott over Bob Dylan any day, not that most would think to compare them except by their shared connection to folk music. My point: Picott lives and learns and suffers among us. Dylan, on the other hand, has lived in Celebrity Land since he was barely out of his teens. Not knowing much about us, he has long since given up writing about recognizable human beings.

Even in the bleakness of Picott's world, we know the characters to whom he introduces us, and we cheer for them. His compassion embraces us, even if it never depends upon sermon or sentimentality to give voice to a kind spirit. Musically, Picott is, at first glance, a thin stream. If you're willing to position yourself along the banks, however, you will be surprised to find yourself standing aside a mighty river.

[ visit Rod Picott's website ]