Coverage

Could there be more to post-Britney pop tart Mandy Moore than albums we won’t listen to and movies we won’t see? Her latest album, a covers collection creatively titled Coverage, suggests that possibility. The Waterboys’ expansive, breathless “Whole of the Moon” benefits from Moore’s big-bucks production, and her twangy take on Carly Simon’s “Anticipation” is the sort of glossy country ballad Nashville can’t seem to get right anymore. There are as many misses as hits (a flat version of “Breakin’ Us in Two” makes you wonder if she’s ever had a relationship go sour), but she earns big points for not only pulling songs from the ranks of the chronically underappreciated (John Hiatt, XTC), but actually doing something interesting with them.