It may be a cliche that you can't get across REAL country music unless you have LIVED the soap opera its lyrics often entails. A few too-poppy glamour girls of today's country might take even ONE page from the stalwart and mighty Ms. Morgan's book and see if it gives them any added, not to mention desperately needed, depth and sincerity.

What has this woman NOT lived through that you hear in EVERY note she sings? Her father, the Grand Ole Opry star George Morgan dies when she is still a young lady, her husband Keith Whitley literally drinks himself to death while she is on the road, and many unfeeling people lambaste her for allegedly not being there for him. She picks up the pieces of her life to continue her fantastic string of hits while raising her kids single-handedly and weathering a handful of unsuccessful other marriages. Let's not forget to mention the tragic death of her mentor and friend Tammy Wynette... a lesser person would simply collapse... much less thrive with some of the most amazing female vocalizing to have come out of Nashville in the past 3 decades.

Save for "Dear Me," " Watch Me" and her duets with her deceased husband, Lorrie fans take note... this album has virtually EVERY other one of the amazing songs that chronicle her staggering career. Highlights include her first top 20 smash, the bluegrassy "Trainwreck Of Emotion," the nearly operatic "Something In Red," the lyrically brilliant story songs "As Good As I Was To You" and "I Guess You Had To Be There," her blockbuster other duets "Maybe Not Tonight" and "Be My Side," and perhaps what should be her signature song for triumphing over emotional hardship, "Standing Tall."

The five new cuts on here continue to demonstrate what an almost indescribable talent Ms. Morgan undeniably is. Her cover of Tammy Wynette's "Another Lonely Song" accomplishes a miracle doing two seemingly opposite things simultaneously. She seems in phrasing and breath to almost channel Tammy while at the same time stamping this song with trademarks of her own. " Whoop-De-Doo" has an almost 50's sass and screw-you-ness that has always worked for Lorrie so well in other monster hits like "Watch Me" and "We Both Walk." Her latest single "To Get To You" is on the verge of trying to be too poppy but the soaring country-feeling chorus saves it. " If I cry" is indeed an easy-listening ballad, more than a country croon, but she still sells it like nobody's business and her cover of Sarah McLachlan's "Angel" contrasts Morgan's throaty passion with Sarah's original etherealness and makes Lorrie's stunning take of this gorgeous song effective and heartbreaking.

Ms. Morgan, to borrow a commercial cliche, is like Coca-Cola. In today's country world of artifice and shallowness, she is ever so much, "THE REAL THING." This album is as close to perfect as it gets.