FALL ALBUM ROUNDUP

BROOKS & DUNN

“Waitin’ on Sundown”

Arista

* * 1/2

For any act that’s racked up as many hits and awards as this country duo, familiarity doesn’t breed contempt so often as it breeds even more hits and awards. It’s a minor miracle, then, that Kix Brooks and Ronnie Dunn spend so much time on their new one consciously avoiding repeating past successes.

That doesn’t mean singles-by-the-numbers have disappeared: “Little Miss Honky Tonk,” “My Kind of Crazy” and “She’s the Kind of Trouble” are precisely the one-note two-steps their titles suggest.

But nearly half the album’s songs dig a little deeper. “If That’s the Way You Want It” compares favorably to one of those disarmingly earnest pledges of love from the Merle Haggard songbook.

The best writing is in Brooks’ and Chick Rains’ “A Few Good Rides Away.” It opens like a predictable lookin’-for-love-in-a-truck-stop tale but develops before you know it into a genuinely touching mini-drama about a faithful waitress and her cowboy who refuse to let the daily grind make them abandon their quest for a better life. Such bright spots make this an admirable boot-scoot forward.

Albums are rated on a scale of one star (poor) to four stars (excellent).