Tracy Nelson is such a classic case of massive unrealized potential that one is tempted to liken her to the Colorado River before Boulder Dam. For the better part of a decade, since her folkie days in Madison, she's lounged around the country, creating a string of nearly great but always flawed albums.

This is her fourth album successively on different labels, but Atlantic comes closest to...

There's heavy irony in this album's title. While other similar singers have evolved unique musical personas—Ronstadt the sexy, country-rocking cousin, Muldaur the urban gypsy eclectic—Nelson's just kept on singing. The success of each of her records has relied on producer and material and that, combined with five label changes in a decade, has left her only what she began with: an...