New from Rhett Miller & Jay Farrar

The Instigator Rhett Miller (electra) ThirdShift-GrottoSlack Jay farrar (Artemis) But Miller, it seems, would be happier if you thought of him as a sensitive, bookish guy who learned as much about turning a phrase in the library as he did at the record store. Take, for example, one of the album's best tracks, "World Inside the World," a song that takes its inspiration from Don DeLillo's Underworld. "There is a world inside the world that you see," Miller sings, accompanied by the ethereal organ-playing of album producer Jon Brion. "I read it in DeLillo, like they'd written it to me." It's a song about the layers and contradictions of love and life?not exactly postmodern lit crit, but as pop songs go it's a pretty smart one.

The album's next track is equally naked in its literary ambition. An ode of sorts to the late poet Sylvia Plath, the bouncy "Point Shirley" recalls the name of the seaside Massachusetts town where Plath stayed occasionally as a child. (She later titled a poem "Point Shirley.") Miller's version, in which he confesses to worrying about an "angry girl" who is trapped in a "shame spiral" and eventually yields to "the downward pull," sounds a lot like the story of Plath's life.

Miller is at his best, though, when he takes leave of his authorial aims and plays straight-up rock songs like the record's first track, "Our Love." A charging anthem about the glories and heartbreak of adultery, it is three minutes of nervous energy, with guitars.

There's only one real misstep on this record. The upbeat "I Want to Live" starts hopefully enough, but it soon becomes one big, ugly cliche. When Miller laments about time wasted "workin' for the man"?and how that time "is never comin' back"?you just have to sigh. And when he sings about "the man upstairs," who, of course, "must have a plan," you want to throttle him.

Miller, some are certain, is destined for very big things. But his chance at greatness will have to wait at least until his next outing with the Old 97's.

Jay Farrar, on the other hand, achieved a measure of greatness years ago. Even more than onetime cohort Jeff Tweedy, it was Farrar who made Uncle Tupelo the band that defined the alt-country sound. His star has since been eclipsed by Tweedy's, who has made sometimes marvelous, sometimes overrated records with Wilco, and last year's release of a forgettable record called Sebastopol signaled the creative nadir for Farrar.

As improbable as it might seem, the EP that marks Farrar's return is a fun little record. A remixed version of Sebastopol's "Damn Shame" turns up here, and it sounds great?lots of percussion and electric guitar. "Station to Station," meanwhile, is exactly the sort of song Farrar should be making at this point: catchy, big-hearted and hopeful. The record's finest track is its first, "Greenwich Time." A jumble of distinctly American images?Farrar sings about "a West that's wild" and "flowing information," "ballot boxes" and "Cold War trash"?it's as well-written and thoughtful a track as almost anything on Yankee Hotel Foxtrot. Faint praise, maybe, but until he makes a record that rivals the best of Wilco, it's the best Farrar can hope for.