Mark Olson & The Original Harmony Ridge Creekdippers - My Own Jo Ellen (2000)

Formerly the frontman for alternative country's Jayhawks, Mark Olson here offers the musical equivalent of comfort food: hand-canned, home-cooked, soothingly hearty in an all-you-can-eat sort of way, with melodies like recipes passed down through generations. The Original Harmony Ridge Creekdippers (the warbling harmonies of wife Victoria Williams and the violin of buddy Mike "Razz" Russell) support Olson's reedy tenor on plainspoken songs of environmental concern ("Meeting in Lone Pine," "Ben Johnson's Creek") and familial intimacy ("Someone to Talk With," "Rainbow of Your Heart"). Though their fourth album occasionally flirts with rock & roll electricity, the Dippers continue their antislickness campaign, matching simple songs to complex times, with the best recalling the hard-won innocence of early Neil Young and earlier Buffalo Springfield. --Don McLeese