This level of self-interrogation is unusual for Callahan—what once might have been suggested poetically is now stated plainly, though with some slightly goofy humor—and it’s disarming at first to hear such diaristic writing from him. “As time wore on I found myself increasingly turning to my guitar instead of other people in times of loneliness and sorrow and confusion,” a spoken passage from “Pathol O.G.,” is not a line you’d expect to hear from the author of “Cold Blooded Old Times.” But familiarity with the full sweep of Callahan’s catalog gives his uncharacteristically direct expression power. It feels like he’s earned it.
“Empathy,” a song addressed…