RECORD REVIEWs

Stevie Nicks

Album: “24 Karat Gold: Songs From the Vault” (Warner Bros.)

Grade: A

As its title suggests, “24 Karat Gold: Songs From the Vault” offers new recordings of tunes Fleetwood Mac frontwoman Stevie Nicks wrote as long ago as 1969; the most recent is from 1995.

Recorded mostly in Nashville with Nicks’ longtime guitarist Waddy Wachtel and Dave Stewart, “24 Karat Gold” makes room amid the retrospection for some new sounds. “Cathouse Blues” touches unexpectedly on ragtime, while “Blue Water,” with backing vocals by Lady Antebellum, shimmers with traces of country and soul.

There’s also a couple of crunching hard-rock numbers, including “I Don’t Care,” that feel powered by the same aggression Fleetwood Mac channeled on its 2013 arena tour. Whatever the arrangement, though, Nicks’ voice defines the music here. Her singing dominates as easily now as it ever did.

—Mikael Wood, Los Angeles Times

Jason Aldean

Album: “Old Boots, New Dirt”

Grade: C+

Jason Aldean, who helped elevate hard rock dynamics and hip-hop conventions in contemporary country music, focuses on his rock side on his sixth studio album, “Old Boots, New Dirt.”

Aldean has always pushed musical innovation but the new album doesn’t offer the surprises of his past efforts. Downplaying his rap influences, Aldean’s new tracks would have fit on a latter-day Aerosmith recording, with dirt roads replacing bright lights. He repeatedly echoes ’80s hard-rock swagger on songs about partying hard (“Just Gettin’ Started,” “Gonna Know We Were Here”), being on the lookout for a new “girl” (”Sweet Little Somethin”’) and emphasizing sex rather than romance (“Burnin’ It Down,” “Laid Back”).

The album has several highlights: “Too Fast” shows off his vocal power and range, “Miss That Girl” reeks of regret and “Two Night Town” is the best traditional country song Aldean has recorded.

But too much of “Old Boots, New Dirt” seems overly predictable, with song after song about drinking, trucks and tan young women in tight jeans.

—Michael McCall, Associated Press

WEEZER

Album: Everything Will Be Alright in the End (Republic)

Grade: B+

The message Rivers Cuomo imparts with this wonderful, woe-is-me Weezer album is: “Rock is dead. Let’s rock.” The album uses sugar-coated hard-rock songs like “Ain’t Got Nobody” and “Eulogy for a Rock Band” to ratify the idea that the band’s style has become passi, that Weezer bandmates are musical dinosaurs. Everything Will Be Alright is a few hooks shy of a masterpiece. Only “I’ve Had It Up to Here” can slouch with the band’s classics. But even the lesser tracks, like “Cleopatra” and “Foolish Father” are crunchy, tasty, and cleverly wrought. And how can you resist Cuomo’s defiant fatalism? It screams, “Time has passed us by. Turn up the amps!”

—David Hiltbrand, Philadelphia Inquirer