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M.J. Fine does it again

If you haven't been following the turmoil in Sheryl Crow's life the past couple of years, Detours is a good way to catch up. Cancer inspired one dark song and motherhood another, while her split with Lance Armstrong is on display in five brokenhearted pieces, including the soulful "Now That You're Gone" and "Diamond Ring." But Crow's more interested in what comes next, and she's turned her social concerns into the catchiest tunes she's had in a long while. Trust a woman whose personal life has been pretty stormy to find a silver lining in Hurricane Katrina ("Love Is Free"), Mideast fighting ("Out of Our Heads") and the world's dwindling supply of fossil fuel ("Gasoline").

Sheryl Crow Tuesday Night Music Club (A&M 1993)

Sheryl Crow Detours (A&M 2008)

You don't have to own a car to feel the urge to sing along to "Gasoline will be free, will be free, yeah yeah yeah," but the line was made for chanting loud with the windows rolled down. Some of the credit should go to producer and co-writer Bill Bottrell, who's returned to Crow's nest after an 11-year absence.

Bottrell produced Tuesday Night Music Club — not the first album Crow made, but the first she released — and co-wrote 10 of its 11 songs. He disappeared during the follow-up in a clash over credit and went on to make solid records with the likes of Rosanne Cash and Shelby Lynne, while Crow kept churning out hits with fewer fingerprints.

Fifteen years later, TNMC's charms have only grown stronger with age. "Leaving Las Vegas," "All I Wanna Do," "Strong Enough" and "Can't Cry Anymore" present a woman in a place she doesn't want to be and not sure what to do about it. Maybe she'll run and maybe she'll curl up in bed. Maybe she'll drown her doubts with another bottle of beer. Maybe she'll turn them into song and make millions.

Deeper in, the stream-of-consciousness "The Na-Na Song" and the jazzy "We Do What We Can" hint at the singer's political awareness, while "I Shall Believe" claims the high ground between blind hope and despair. Every song is a different patch of the same earth, and whatever their songwriting pedigree, Crow — with her vulnerable but determined voice — completely owns the territory.

(m_fine@citypaper.net)

Join Sheryl Crow's Saturday Night Music Club when she plays the Mann on Aug. 2