What You Whispered

Paradoxically, this Cleveland-born, now New England-based songwriter has been at his best when drawing on the lyrical space and spare country blues of the South. His best album, 1996's East Asheville Hardware, is an intimate acoustic homage to his years in North Carolina. On What You Whispered, Wilcox often recaptures that homespun, unpretentious sincerity. A twangy National steel guitar figure opens his eighth album, complementing a memorably amorous lyric, and later returns for the sweaty, sexy funk of "Whisper of the Wheels," in which the road mirrors a woman's necessary but frightening self-discovery. Choosing to record at his Maryland home, Wilcox sounds mellow and assured, mostly abandoning the crutch of platitudinous folk-pop. It may still require effort to get past New Age sermons like "Rule Number One" or "Start with the Ending," but Wilcox seems to be finding his voice again. --Roy Kasten