Lee Brice Appears at Joe's Pub In 2009 Lee Brice released "Love Like Crazy," the first single from the album of the same title, a pulpy croon that shuttled between two seemingly competing sides of Mr. Brice's personality. Is he a wide-eyed celebrant of everlasting love or a kooky raconteur of life's little offbeat surprises? A little of both, as it happens, especially when it comes to the subject of crazy, which straddles the two. "Crazy Girl," a song Mr. Brice wrote several years ago, became a major hit for the Eli Young Band last year. And on Mr. Brice's new album, "Hard 2 Love" (Curb), which was released on Tuesday, he slyly updates the theme, weaving it into "That Way Again," a heartrending tale of a shattered marriage. "He used to love her like crazy/You couldn't pull "em apart/God, she felt so unbelievable in his arms," he sings, his voice swelling as he concludes, "She don't wanna leave/She just needs him to be that way again." Mr. Brice sings versions of those phrases three times: first, as the narrator; second, as the wife considers another man; and finally, in the words she unleashes on her husband as he threatens to undo her for good with his disregard. Each time Mr. Brice's singing gets nervier and more sweaty, hard with bravado but teetering on a thinner and thinner edge. It's vivid, bloody stuff. "This is my favorite song on the new album," Mr. Brice said before playing "That Way Again" on Monday night at Joe's Pub, early during a show celebrating the release of the moving and often wise "Hard 2 Love," one of the year's most impressive country albums. Muscle ballads are Mr. Brice's thing, soft songs that roar and roll forcefully like a tractor-trailer. A relative newcomer, though he was at the fringes of Nashville success for many years, Mr. Brice - built like an ex-college football player (which he was) after a few years in middle management - has quickly established himself. He's not a provocateur and he's not overly ambitious with his songwriting or singing. He resides in the comfortable middle, and he owns it. His style is a compromise between Nashville's seemingly overwhelming soft-rock urges and its need for brawn. He's melodically eloquent, and stoic enough that his emotional breakdowns have real potency. That's a blend also in evidence on Kip Moore's sturdy debut album, "Up All Night" (MCA Nashville), which was also released on Tuesday and which sprinkles a bit of Mellencamp and 1980s power rock into the mix. Also occupying this territory is the clever and promising singer and songwriter Jerrod Niemann, who has a sense of humor Mr. Brice can't quite match. The two wrote a song together (with Jon Stone), "That's When You Know It's Over," for Mr. Brice's new album, with Mr. Brice's dour punches taking the lead. It's one of several stark standout tracks on the new album, songs that lent much of Mr. Brice's performance an intense feel, which was compounded by his minimal backing: just Travis Bettis on guitar and Reggie Smith on keyboard. That mood peaked with "I Drive Your Truck," about losing a family member to war. It's an electric, overpowering song, and Mr. Brice sang it vigorously, even during the scorched parts: "Mama asked me this morning if I'd been by your grave/ But that flag and stone ain't where I feel you anyway." After that song ended, the audience gasped for air slightly, and one person shouted out a request for "Beer," the most lighthearted song on the new album. "That's terrible to do acoustic," Mr. Brice replied, and offered up instead an equally loopy number, "Parking Lot Party," about a tailgate that never ends. At this point Mr. Brice's goofy side kicked in, full of cheesy between-song banter and facial expressions somewhere between the theatrics of Cameron on "Modern Family" and the Kabuki of a father trying to get the attention of his newborn baby. At the encore he finally gave in, downed a drink in one gulp and played a rowdy "Beer." But while he ended that way, it was only a momentary concession. Earlier he'd played "A Woman Like You," a winky flirtation in the Brad Paisley vein that was recently No. 1 on the Billboard country song chart. It's Mr. Brice at his best, tempering good-ol"-boy references with steady romantic fealty: I'd have a dirt bike in the shed Not one throw pillow on the bed I'd keep my cash in a coffee can But if I was a single man Alone and out there on the loose I'd be looking for a woman like you