Nearly a quarter-century after she sang about it, Chrissie Hynde has gone back to Ohio — literally and figuratively. Rock's most famous Akronite-turned-Londoner has been spending more time in her Rust Belt hometown, where she has opened a vegan restaurant. And on Break Up the Concrete, she has returned to the American musical heartland, injecting her songs with the hopped-up sound of early rock & roll. The result is the best Pretenders record in years, a mix of galloping rockabilly and country & western songs, delivered in Hynde's trademark snarl — the voice of the toughest chick in the biker gang. There are Bo Diddley-style rave-ups ("Break Up the Concrete"), pedal steel weepers ("One Thing Never Changed") and boogie blues ("Rosalee"), played with crackling efficiency and anchored by virtuoso drummer Jim Keltner. The sound is raucous, but Hynde's songs are grown-up: sad and wise reflections on politics and relationships, with a romanticism that's hard-edged and hard-won. "Every drop that runs through the vein," she sings in "Boots of Chinese Plastic," "always makes its way back to the heart again."