Kelly Hogan: I Like To Keep Myself In Pain (2012)

Kelly Hogan makes country music for those of us who wouldn't be caught dead listening to country music. Like Neko Case (with whom she has performed over the years), Hogan has a drop-dead voice that I'd listen to regardless of whatever songs she happened to wrap it around, and taste in material that, while cribbing freely from country, jazz, and singer-songwriter pop, avoids some of the sappier cliches that can drag down comparable artists.

Hogan got her start with 80s college radio band The Judy ...