'Car Wheels on a Gravel Road'

This is a fantastic album and any kudos and superlatives that you'd like to lay down at its feet is more than deserving.

However, if I can offer any criticism of the record it's this: Lucinda Williams' vocals.

Here's the issue: I realize that Williams isn't a vocalist as much as she's an artist and songwriter. And I also realize that maybe she doesn't really care and when she sings "Right in Time" and "Car Wheels on a Gravel Road" that the vocals aren't as important as, say, the musicians, harmonies or lyrics.

All of this is fine until you get to more spirited and inspired vocal performances "Greenville," "Jackson" and "Concrete and Barbed Wire." In these songs she offers a certain twang and really finishes off notes. They're just all around better songs because of this.

Clearly, she knows how to inject life into her vocals, but I guess she doesn't care. She's just too cool to sing well all the time.