Like Springsteen's 'Nebraska,' Billy Bragg's first two albums were more noble concept than they were fun listening. In person, Bragg could pull off the God's-angry-loner act: lugging his guitar and small amp from gig to gig, singing witty, strident songs about love and the fate of the world, he stood tall as the antithesis of videos and hype. But his earlier, somewhat didactic discs wore a bit thin, at least to American ears. Now – on this album cheerfully subtitled The Difficult Third Album – Bragg expands his pared-down sound ever so slightly (violin here, piano and tambourine there). While purists might bitch, the result is a winning mesh, by turns as political as the Clash, as clever as Elvis Costello, as melodic as Ray Davies and as rocking as Chuck Berry.

"Levi Stubbs' Tears" encapsulates Bragg's catchy pop folk; after a few casual guitar strums, he kicks in with a spare R&B bass line, unleashing his impassioned Londoner's tenor. "Tears" is a musical equivalent of Woody Allen's Purple Rose of Cairo – a woman deserted by her husband finds comfort in the reliability of old Motown standards. Bragg sketches with more care than the typical popster: the husband is "the sort who only laughs at his own jokes/The sort a war takes away/And when there wasn't a war he left anyway." The mournful mix of fluegelhorn and conga helps evoke Motown without plagiarizing.

While running the gamut from a piano-hall rag to the psychedelic nugget "Train Train," Bragg's songs are always original and biting. Singing against a danceable Bo Diddley backbeat in "Help Save the Youth of America," he turns Beach Boys imagery inside out – "having fun fun fun/Till Daddy takes the gun away" – and notes that "a nation with their freezers full/Are dancing in their seats/While outside another nation/Is sleeping in the streets."

Bragg's sometimes preachy outrage is tempered both by an uncanny versatility with the guitar and by quieter narratives about less global concerns. He's grappling with the issues of growing up. In "The Marriage," he reluctantly gives in to his woman's demand: "So drag me to the altar/And I'll make my sacrifice"; in "The Passion," a young couple weds out of necessity and ends up living in silent hatred.

Bragg also has his sweet side; for every song about "ideologies clashing" there is also a song of hope, usually pinned to a woman. In the opening "Greetings to the New Brunette," he sings, "Shirley – you're my reason to get out of bed before noon." And with Talking with the Taxman, Bragg gives slumbering rock listeners an important, soulful reason to wake up. (RS 496)

DAVID HANDELMAN