Milly's Café / Milly's Cafe

Fred Eaglesmith loves the road. The fiercely independent Canadian singer/songwriter's 16th album listens like a stagecoach trip down Route 66, taking its own sweet time in order to sniff out every corner like an Old West Canterbury Tales. The Springsteen-esque opener, "18 Wheels," follows the plight of a lovelorn truckdriver trying to fight the urge to plead his way back into the arms of his estranged lover. It's a fitting start for Milly's Cafe, a sparse and determined collection of stories that refuses to ever break into a gallop — even the rolling title cut, a Bonnie & Clyde-inspired tale of guns and redemption, barely achieves midtempo. Still, it's an affecting album that uses the space allotted to it as a strength. The languid "Summer Is Over" is all Ferris wheels and small-town lemonade, while the heartbreaking "Rocky," which follows the correspondence between two weathered and ailing cowboys withering away in separate retirement homes, keeps reality clearly in check. It's a road-trip record in the classic sense, and one that's got a confection for whatever mood you may find yourself in.