More than any children's music release this year, Justin Roberts's Way Out makes you want to buy multiple copies and pass them out to friends--if only to prove that children's music can be unaccountably great. Justin's gift for transplanting himself into the psyche of an 8-year-old lifts him head and shoulders above his goofy-voiced peers. However, simply pinning Justin's talent on songwriting alone sells him short--few others (Dan Zanes, Ralph Covert and They Might Be Giants are exceptions) rock their records as hard. Way Out draws us way in, expertly mowing down musical age barriers and delivering us from the mistaken idea that kidstuff doesn't count. -Tammy La Gorce