Listening to an Alejandro Escovedo album is a bit like thumbing through the diaries of a seeker. On his second solo effort, Thirteen Years, this singer/songwriter based in Austin, Texas, uses breathtakingly beautiful musical settings for his introspective lyrics – lyrics that, for the most part, question the roads he has chosen for nearly a decade and a half.

A crucial leg of his journey consisted of a five-year stint in the True Believers, the no-holds-barred band of ravers that featured the alternating lead vocals and triple-guitar attack of Escovedo, his brother Javier and lap-steel maestro Jon Dee Graham, Hard Road, a reissue of the defunct combo's two albums (the first originally on Rounder in 1986, the second never released by EMI), vividly documents the boys' budding songwriting skills, if not quite the fiery assault of their live performances. In a sense, neither album fully caught the essence of the band: the first was too muddy sounding, the second too slick.

There are standouts aplenty, though, both from the debut, produced by Jim Dickinson (Alex Chilton, the Replacements), and the second, produced by Jeff Glixman (Georgia Satellites); both LPs, by the way, were originally entitled True Believers. Mostly collaborative efforts, the original songs among the '86 recordings include the Escovedo brothers' galloping "Ring the Bell" and churning "Hard Road," as well as Graham's stunning ballad "Sleep Enough to Dream." Alejandro's tuneful reproach "The Rain Won't Help You When It's Over" points in the more inward-looking direction he would later pursue.

For their aborted EMI release, most of the writing was done by each Escovedo brother individually, with two songs by Graham. The Believers' rhythm section, bassist Denny DeGorio and drummer Kevin Foley, was replaced by studio pros.

On the whole, it's a harder-rocking album, but the toned-down, more bittersweet songs are the most effective, particularly Graham's "One Moment to Another," Javier's "Who Calls My Name," and Alejandro's "Outside Your Door," which features harmony vocals by David Hidalgo of Los Lobos. After completing this would-be breakthrough, the road-fried Believers were dropped by EMI, sealing the band's fate once and for all.

On the title track of Thirteen Years, Escovedo's travails as a journeyman musician – from San Francisco thrasher (in the Nuns) to New York cow punk (Rank and File) to Austin rocker (where he quit R&F to form the True Believers) to solo artist – are plaintively recounted. Has his chosen pròfession been worth the losses suffered? From a listener's viewpoint the answer would have to be a resounding yes.

Indeed, Thirteen Years masterfully illustrates the songwriter's maturation into an incisive, thoughtful lyricist and ambitious musical architect. In a manner that recalls the evocative music of the late English singer/songwriter Nick Drake, the album features a delicate string section, which hauntingly emphasizes Escovedo's somber look back. It opens with the first song Escovedo ever wrote – the hopeful, Spanishtinged "Ballad of the Sun and the Moon" – and closes with an older, wiser "The End," composed spontaneously in the recording studio.

While, overall, Thirteen Years is melancholic, Escovedo's resilience and feistiness still come across by way of gutsy electric-guitar work. Producer Stephen Bruton (a frequent collaborator with Bonnie Raitt) lets his ax rip on "Mountain of Mud," and Charlie Sexton of the Arc Angels adds raucous punch to "Losing Your Touch." "Tell Me Why," a country-blues number that scoffs at the truism "Time heals all," is punctuated by the lonesome harmonica of Mickey Raphael.

However much Escovedo may ponder the vicissitudes of his life and career on Thirteen Years, one thing is certain: He has fully arrived as a soulful and eloquent singer/songwriter.

Thirteen Years by Alejandro Escovedo is available by calling Watermelon at (512) 458-6275. (RS 682)

HOLLY GEORGE-WARREN