Madeline: White Flag

On White Flag, Madeline Adams of Athens, Georgia, sings singer-songwriter countryesque pop in a high, nice voice with faint sheep-quiver overtones. She has the knack of singing an emotion simply, of not overworking things, of stating them and letting them float into you. The guitar bobbles and twangs, knobbling along like a car going over popcorn. Other, less-successful musicians have shown that it’s not enough to have a good voice and the ability to play a guitar, you also need to be able to tuck everything you’ve got into the bento box of an actual song. Songs she can do: blues here, banjo-folk there. Persuasive and appealing.