Even when Loudon Wainwright III was writing songs in his early 20s, many of his characters were already looking back wistfully at their younger days -- such as the protagonist of his 1970 recording "School Days," who begins his tale, "In Delaware when I was younger..."

"They're songs written by a young man and originally recorded when he was a young man," says Wainwright, 61. "But now, tragically, I'm not a young man anymore, and I am singing about getting old when I am old."

This is more than an abstract issue for Wainwright. Earlier this year he got together with a band and made new recordings of 13 of his early songs. The resulting album, Recovery, is a creative reinvention that forced him to negotiate the shifting emotional nuances wrought by the years.

On Recovery, being released today, Wainwright brings band arrangements to songs that in all but two cases were originally recorded solo. The lineup of Patrick Warren, Greg Leisz, David Piltch and Jay Bellerose is best known for its work with musician and producer Joe Henry.

The idea came from Henry, who produced and co-wrote Wainwright's last album, Strange Weirdos, the soundtrack for the Judd Apatow comedy "Knocked Up." It was at those sessions that Recovery took root.

"Going to those songs again and doing them with this band made me appreciate them in a different kind of way," Wainwright says.

"It was an interesting process... When you're singing a song like 'Motel Blues,' which was written by a 23-year-old guy, and then you're singing it and you're 61, and the line is 'Come up to my motel room and save my life,' it has a whole other kind of layer and meaning to it, which again I hope listeners will find interesting."

White's "Deep Cuts," which came out in June, is the most radical of the three new collections, inspired by the late blues singer R.L. Burnside's Come On In, a 1998 album that melded blues with beats, samples and loops.

The 65-year-old country-rock-blues storyteller sounds more like Nick Cave here, and producer Jody White admits that reaction has been mixed.

"I think people either love it or hate it. There hasn't been a lot of middle ground. The annoying part if it is, inevitably, you're going to get this stance from press: 'Well, it's not as good as the original.'

"That's such an easy and weak stance to take. I know it's not. That was recorded in the late '60s with the incredible old gear and incredible musicians and producers who took their time with it, and my dad was in his 20s then... I know they're not better than the originals."

If the risk of alienating fans is a drawback, it might be balanced by the lure of rediscovery.

While a few of the songs on Recovery have remained active in Wainwright's live repertoire, others were strangers when he reencountered them.

"It is like somebody else's work, despite the fact that it's me," he notes. "But I think the songs hold up. I think they're good songs -- I mean if you like the way I write songs. So I was quite pleased to go to a song like 'The Movies Are a Mother to Me,' which I had completely forgotten about, and think, 'You know, that guy was pretty good.' "


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