Montgomery Gentry makes song their own on ‘Do Your Thing’

Montgomery Gentry

“You Do Your Thing” (Columbia) •••

It’s standard practice in Nashville to have hits custom-made by eager tunesmiths. Big stars are too busy signing autographs and looking cool in cowboy hats to take the time to compose their own songs.

Still, it comes as a surprise that the two Montgomery Gentry guys don’t write a lick. That’s because on “You Do Your Thing,” the fourth album by the tough-guy duo, their brooding Marshall Tucker-meets-Hank Williams Jr. blend comes across as so seamlessly their own.

The honky-tonk rock songs they pick eschew simple-minded piety, preferring to keep things messy and ambiguous, like real life. While the chorus of the title cut expresses a live-and-let-live sentiment, Eddie Montgomery turns it into a statement of barely contained rage by the song’s protagonist directed at people whom he suspects are looking for a handout, or are not willing to fight for Uncle Sam.

And “She Loved Me,” in which our ZZ Top-loving hero ends up in Alcoholics Anonymous, divorced and missing his kids, is delivered with an honesty that’s hard to come by on the country charts.

— Dan DeLuca

Slipknot

“Vol. 3: The Subliminal Verses” (Roadrunner) ••• 1/2

They’re ooky and they’re spooky. They’re as notorious for handmade monster masks as for vicious speed metal and nihilist lyrics. But on this fourth album, the nine guys of Slipknot slipped some saccharine into their morphine-drip aesthetic to create a thick sound, sweeter and more melodic than imaginable for dudes masquerading as the spawn of “Halloween’s” Michael Myers.

With producer Rick Rubin providing sonic density and symphonic squiggles, the band often manages subtle, elegant choruses in support of primal singer Corey Taylor’s increasingly paranoid lyrics. It also creates a swirling ambience for “Danger — Keep Away” and a wall of howling guitars for “Prelude 3.0.”

Even when the proceedings are at their screeching best, Slipknot adds a caramel coating, such as the boy-pop choruses on tunes such as “The Nameless.”

— A.D. Amorosi

The Streets

“A Grand Don’t Come for Free” (Vice) ••••

Nobody else sounds quite like Mike Skinner, the 25-year-old Englishman who records as The Streets.

On The Streets’ 2002 debut, “Original Pirate Material,” Skinner proved himself a master of finding high drama in everyday life. “Grand” ups the ante, presenting an epic meditation on romance and friendship through an album-length narrative about a broken TV set, some missing cash, and lots of alcohol, smoke and pills.

Repeated listens are required to fully grasp the plot, but that’s part of the fun; “Grand is like a book you can dance to.”

— Amy Phillips

Sonic Youth

“Sonic Nurse” (Universal) •••

While growing older — Kim Gordon turned 50 last year — Sonic Youth has expertly maintained its art-rock credibility. Yet though the downtown New Yorkers’ influence as post-punk experimentalists stretching back to 1981 is beyond question, there’s no question that trailblazing is behind them.

So despite Thurston Moore’s promise that this new album “sounds like nothing we’ve ever done before,” we find that with its locked-in grooves, occasional bursts of noise and half-murmured vocals from Gordon and Moore, it sounds pretty much like everything Sonic Youth has done before.

Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Occasionally, the group gets too obscure for its own good, and the apparent anti-Bush political thrust of “Peace Attack” misses its target. But for a band of codgers, Sonic Youth is still pretty proficient at working its signature sound.

– Dan DeLuca

Everlast

“White Trash Beautiful” (Island/Def Jam) ••

It’s been a few years since we’ve heard from bad-boy strum ‘n’ bass troubadour Everlast. Judging by the handful of surprisingly soft and vulnerable love songs on his third solo album, he’s been in the throes of serious lovesickness. Either that, or he’s pilfering lyrics from Hallmark cards.

Devoting a third of this record to such trite tunes proves problematic for the former House of Pain hooligan. And his gritty street-life vignettes — mostly sung, occasionally rapped in his signature husky voice — remain chained to the minor-key acoustic guitar-with-hip-hop-beat template established on his first two discs.

Airtight slices of streetwise funk such as “God Wanna” and “Ticking Away” give “White Trash Beautiful” a little kick, but not much.

— Patrick Berkery