Try this: Go to a record store that allows you to listen to CDs before buying them and ask to hear Trampoline, the current release by the Mavericks. Play the first track, "Dance the Night Away," and notice the bouncing, chugging acoustic guitar line and glittering tambourine. Listen a few more seconds until the rest of the band enters, an explosion of drums, bass, and a mariachi horn section as bright and festive as a handful of New Year's Eve confetti. Listen longer until the vocal begins: a voice like a cross between Elvis and Roy Orbison announcing "Here comes my happiness again," with more than enough joy to make you believe it.

Then put the headphones down and leave the store, without hearing another note. You won't want to. You might not even be able to. Well, maybe just one more song then...

It doesn't matter how many songs you play: Trampoline refuses to be disliked. It serves up sprightly dance numbers, soul-wrenching balladry, electric sitars, Byrds-ian vocal harmonies, gospel rave-ups, weird percussion, and the aforementioned mariachi trumpets in the firm belief that a) listening to music should be fun, and b) listening to the Mavericks ought to be the most fun you can possibly have with a pair of headphones. The Mavericks have a reputation for good songwriting and genre-hopping experimentation (in that order), and this combined with strong ensemble playing has earned them a sizeable following among rock/alternative listeners who normally don't stray within a mile of anything with a whiff of Nashville on it. The upshot of all this being: If by this point you're still thinking to yourself, "But I can't stand country music!"—well, first of all, shame on you. And secondly, this ain't Garth Brooks, punk.

Consider, for example, a ballad called "I've Got This Feeling," about midway through the disk (track 6, if you care to punch it up in the store). This song will never be a wedding standard or a homecoming theme: its tempo is too fast, its rhythm too subtle for generations of so-so dancers to make a classic of it. Yet it's a gorgeous song. Beginning with the sigh of a crashing cymbal, an electric guitar picks out a stark melody line, supported by a so-quiet-it's-not-there string section and a quick tom-tom fill. This spare arrangement holds throughout the verses, sung by singer/primary songwriter Raul Malo in a bold tenor, and then the chorus comes: the strings burst to life, a horn section opens out like a jack in the box, and Malo's voice becomes triumphant in the midst of heartache as he sings: "I've got this feeling inside/tomorrow will turn out all right/'cause I'll have you here by my side/to hold you and love you with all of my might." Original sentiments? Hardly. But you'll be too happy to care.

A list of the album's other pleasures would take a long time to recite, time which you'd do better to spend driving to the music store, but a few other high points are worth mentioning. A mid-tempo number called "I Should Know" features some spicy hornwork and a lovely, catchy chorus, while "Someone Should Tell Her" is all fast, giddy fun, where the horn section trades riffs with a Hammond organ straight off a Beatles album. There's "Fool #1," a torch ballad that sounds like a cross between Chris Isaac and Robbie Fulks, and a delightful mutt of an instrumental called "Melbourne Mambo," likely to set your hips shaking just as you're wondering where the hell it came from. And the album closes with a 24-karat country weeper called "Dream River," featuring only Malo and an acoustic guitar in a performance worthy of Johnny Cash.

Trampoline isn't deep; there are no messages apart from those you've heard a hundred times already, about how love can be the greatest thing in the world when it isn't smashing your heart to bits, etc., etc. But one of the most important things music can do is give us new ways to express that which we know already, and on that count, Trampoline scores high. It's also fun, charming, funny, and often gorgeous to listen to. And that, I humbly submit, is the best thing music can be.