Dirt Farmer by Levon Helm

Dirt Farmer, released on Vanguard on October 30, 2007, was Levon Helm's first studio album since 1982, and every rasp on it is hard-won. The Band's old drummer and singer had been diagnosed with throat cancer in 1998 and lost his singing voice to it; after treatment the cancer went into remission and the voice came back bit by bit, and here it is, weathered but still soulful, the country never far from it.

Guitarist Larry Campbell, a fellow Bob Dylan alumnus, produced it with Helm's daughter Amy, and both sing and play on it, so the record feels like a family gathering on the porch rather than a comeback campaign. The songs lean deep into American folk, unhurried and rootsy, with "The Mountain" among them. It won the Grammy for Best Traditional Folk Album in February 2008, and its follow-up, Electric Dirt, went on to win a Grammy of its own.

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