Jenny Lewis -- 'Acid Tongue'

ALBUM
Sept. 23

When Jenny Lewis released her first solo album, 2006’s Rabbit Fur Coat, she expressed the hope that she would make another one before she turned 50. The singer-songwriter, who also fronts L.A. indie rockers Rilo Kiley, has handily beat that deadline with Acid Tongue. In fact, the 32-year-old is going through a rather prolific phase. It’s barely a year since the last Rilo Kiley album, Under the Blacklight, and Lewis also sang on Momofuku, the recent album by Elvis Costello, who returns the favor on the uptempo Acid Tongue duet ”Carpetbaggers.” ”I’m just sort of riding the wave, in fear that I won’t be able to write songs five years from now,” says Lewis. ”I just have this fear that I’m going to lose the ability.”

Other vocal contributors to the country-tinged collection include Black Crowes singer Chris Robinson, Zooey Deschanel, and M. Ward. Lewis’ sister also shows up on a couple of tracks, and her father, harmonica player Eddie Gordon, plays bass harp on rumbling country-gospel tune ”Jack Killed Mom.” Lewis’ parents divorced when she was young, and the singer says that she had not spoken to her dad in ”a very long time.” But the pair reconnected after Gordon was diagnosed with cancer. (Lewis references her father’s illness on the nine-minute ”The Next Messiah.”) ”He is not well,” she says, ”but we hope he’s getting better.”