"I feel like I'm feeling again," declares Todd Steed in the lead track on his latest congregation of tunes, and he's right. Chicks Ahoy is his most rocking' album in years, chock full of energetic riffs, crunchy guitar solos, and even smarter smartass observations. The Opposable Thumbs-with Dave Jenkins on drums and Paul Noe on bass-bring out the rocker in Steed, and this collection is as focused and straightforward as anything he's done since the demise of Smokin' Dave and the Premo Dopes. While his current local project, Apelife, may be more loose and experimental, the Thumbs crash ahead with short, snappy numbers in that all-too-rare genre known as simple rock 'n' roll.

You can hear it right away in that first song, "Nobody's Full" insistent guitar strumming that builds to a jumpin' beat and finally rocks out with the kind of immediate, joyful hooks that make you turn up the knob on the car's CD player. But underneath those catchy chords are lyrics examining Steed's own motives for continuing to play in a rock band: "Nobody's full/if you still want me/My dreams are cool/but they still haunt me/Wonder why I was born-was it just an accident?/Was my bad luck homemade or heaven-sent?"  While "maturity" may be code for "getting really dull" when describing most aging rock singers, for Steed it just means he's balancing his rambunctious wit with an even stronger sense of self.

Either you get Todd S teed's persona and humor or you don't; for rock fans more accustomed to flashpots and blood, mascara and heroin addiction-you know, real rock stars-Steed won't make much sense at all. He's a nice guy in his 30s armed with a guitar and rather sardonic views of the world and of himself, who eschews the typical rock song topics (which, these days, seem to focus on just how awful everything is) for stuff actually happening in his life at the moment. And that ranges from telling a girl to dump her boyfriend ("Free Advice From Me") to how much he misses vinyl record album covers ("I Miss LP Covers"). The songs are often just as goofy as those old Smokin' Dave favorites, but with Chicks Ahoy, Steed sounds like he means what he sings even more so than before-not more serious, mind you, but perhaps more heartfelt.

Check out another stand-out tune, "Five O'clock"-stuck in an office job, Steed confesses his fears of becoming "one of them" as he waits for the clock to hit five. As guitars ring and drums pound, he chants a rush of desires: "I want to get out, be there, at home in my chair and get stoned, just by lookin, just by lookin around/I want to cut loose, get loud, burn words, hang out, shift back...shift back to who I think I thought I was."  This is not the kind of self-reflective wistfulness you're going to get from a rocker in his twenties; but it is the honest thoughts of someone who's found himself in an unexpected place later in life. And as I type this in an office downtown, it's the kind of hummable tune that becomes a private anthem.

We've said it before (to the point where other local music scene experts have accused us of playing "favorites"), but I'll say it again: Knoxville's lucky to have Todd Steed. And, yes, he is a favorite-because he's as fine a songwriter as our beloved scene has ever had. So get over it, and then go see the Thumbs play at their CD release party, October 1 at the Longbranch Saloon.

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