Re-recording a back catalog is a calculated risk for most artists. While hindsight may give musicians a wiser perspective than they had years before, it also encourages some people to fix things that weren't really broken. And more often than not, the motivation to recut older material is to get a second payday out of a set of songs rather than revealing a new creative perspective. Both art and commerce may have been factors in ' decision to take another shot at the songs from her 1992 album, . famously battled producers, A&R men, and label executives for control while making the original album, and it was recorded for a label that has since gone out of business, so chances are good she's not getting royalties for it anymore. For whatever reason, 2017's finds remaking the songs from her 1992 release, sometimes faithfully and sometimes with fresh arrangements and lyrical revisions. ("He Never Got Enough Love" even gets a new chorus and title, "Drivin' Down a Dead End Street.") From a musical standpoint, is a genuine improvement over the original LP. Here is backed by her road band, and they give the material an approach that feels more organic, especially with on guitar, while their push-and-pull with ' vocals boasts more nuance. These recordings also lack the very dated drum sounds and production decisions that feel like flaws 25 years after was first released. But the double-edged sword here is ' vocals. On , she often sounded like she was still learning how to best interpret her material, and she occasionally seemed clumsy and unsure, though never less than emotionally honest. is the work of a far more confident and experienced vocalist, and her phrasing here generally works better. However, her voice at the age of 64 is considerably grainier and less supple that it was at 39, and if her technique has improved with time, her instrument most certainly has not. is hardly a bad vocalist on , but the inevitable comparisons to the earlier recordings of this material are not flattering, and that's the biggest stumbling block for old fans giving this a listen. One thing is certain: in either version, this is a set of great songs from a master tunesmith, and performs her material with greater intelligence and soul than anyone else could muster. When you remember that once covered the title track of , you know that's no small accomplishment. ~ Mark Deming