"I believe in prophecy," Baez sings on her new album. For five decades, her ringing soprano has been a prophetic sound, summoning the earnestness and anger — and, a bit too often, the self-righteousness — of the folk revival that made her its poster child. For her 24th studio release, Baez has teamed up with Steve Earle, who produced the album and contributed three songs. It's a fruitful partnership: Earle's hard-won earthiness acts as a counterweight to Baez's ethereal tendencies, and Day After Tomorrow leans toward tough-minded material with blues and Appalachian overtones — songs like Elvis Costello and T Bone Burnett's "Scarlet Tide," and the miner's lament "Henry Russell's Last Words." Best of all is the title track, Tom Waits' heartbreaking Iraq War ballad, sung in the voice of a frightened GI: "What I miss you won't believe/Shoveling snow and raking leaves." Delivered by Baez with dusky restraint, it proves an old protest-music lesson too often unheeded: When it comes to prophesying, stories work better than slogans.