It doesn't seem possible that nearly a decade has passed since singer/songwriter John Prine last released a full album of his own original work, which fans will tell you consistently runs the gamut from piercingly poignant to goofier than Mickey Mouse's best friend.

After all, this is the notoriously prolific John Prine, who once put together a string of seven albums in nine years, six of them in consecutive years.

And yet here we are, almost 10 years after Prine's brilliant "Lost Dogs & Mixed Blessings" in 1995, and 5 years after he wrote a lone original track to serve as the title for "In Spite of Ourselves," his covers-and-duets collection from 1999.

After struggling for close to five years with the songwriting muse that once seemed almost effortless, Prine finally assembled what may stand as some of the finest work of his career for the creakily wonderful "Fair & Square."

The thing that truly distinguishes "Fair & Square" from the rest of Prine's exemplary catalog is how close it came to never happening, not because of writer's block or a stagnant music business or any petty external causes.

Had Prine chosen to ignore a growth on his neck, we may have gathered here on the 10th anniversary of "Lost Dogs & Mixed Blessings" to celebrate the very last John Prine album ever.

A cancer diagnosis presents a particularly pointed opportunity for self-assessment and reflection, a time to ponder one's accomplishments and failures and to put them in the perspective of one's potentially diminishing timeline.

In 1998, Prine was offered that unwelcome and non-negotiable opportunity when a lump on his neck that had initially been diagnosed as benign turned out to be anything but.

He had just started the sessions that ultimately became "In Spite of Ourselves," a spirited album of covers done as duets with a veritable who's who of female country/folk talent (including Emmylou Harris, Patty Loveless, Iris DeMent, Trisha Yearwood and Lucinda Williams), but he had no choice other than to abandon the album for the time being and concentrate on his health.

After locating doctors in Houston through former producer Knox Phillips (son of Sun Record founder Sam Phillips), who had been treated there successfully for a similar cancer, Prine submitted himself to surgery and the subsequent regimen of chemotherapy.

Thankfully, all of the procedures proved to be just as successful for Prine, who has been cancer-free for the past seven years.

He resumed work on "In Spite of Ourselves," released to glowing reviews, and he then rerecorded a handful of his own favorites to reclaim the master recording rights for 2000's "Souvenirs."

But an odd thing had happened as a result of either the surgery or the chemo treatments. Prine's voice dropped about an octave, forcing him to drop the tunings on his songs, the first time in his 30-plus year career that he had made such an adjustment.

After enduring the soul-searching that inevitably accompanies the cancer experience, Prine found it necessary to assess his musical identity from the ' most basic mechanical standpoint. As it happened, Prine came to some important realizations concerning his legacy, particularly the songs that dated from the earliest parts of his career.

"I sure am glad those songs were as good as they are," says Prine from his longtime Nashville home. "Just changing the key made those songs brand new for me. The first time I went in front of an audience that way, I was like, 'Wow, who wrote this?' I'm thankful that kid knew how to write so good."

Did he ever. Prine's eponymous debut album in 1971 was filled to bursting with songs that were destined to become classics, not only within his own repertoire, but as a part of pop culture ("Some of them have turned into campfire songs," says a bemused Prine of his early catalog).

The deceptively lullaby refrain of "Sam Stone" ("There's a hole in Daddy's arm where all the money goes..."), the wistful remembrance of "Paradise," the smirking nudge of "Illegal Smile," the exquisite longing of "Angel From Montgomery" and the plaintive certainty of "Hello in There" all combined to inspire Kris Kristofferson to comment in his liner notes for the album that hearing Prine for the first time was akin to "stumbling upon Dylan when he first busted upon the Village scene."

The media took it one step further and anointed Prine "the next Bob Dylan," eliciting his famously self-effacing response when asked how he viewed that sentiment: "I don't think we're done with the last one."

It was heady praise for a former mailman who had taken to hanging around Chicago's Old Town School of Folk Music with friend Steve Goodman and plying the city's coffeehouse circuit with his homespun humor, folksy charm and set after set of wickedly insightful songs.

After Goodman convinced Kristofferson and schlockmeister Paul Anka into catching Prine's after hours set at a Chicago club in 1970, things happened fast.

Within weeks, Goodman had Prine added to his gig at New York's Bitter End where he was seen by Atlantic Records exec Jerry Wexler. In short order, Wexler signed Prine and shipped him down to Memphis to record his astonishing 1971 debut.

Prine's Atlantic years produced his sophomore album "Diamonds in the Rough," the equally impressive "Sweet Revenge," the commercially designed, but brutally honest "Common Sense."

Although Prine's commercial success with these albums was less than the label might have hoped, Prine's mailbox was filling up with royalties earned from his peers recording his songs.

From his very first album, other artists recognized Prine as a singular writing talent. He found his songs being covered by a broad spectrum of other singer/songwriters, including the Everly Brothers, Bette Midler and Joan Baez.

At a time when Prine had determined to do something different with his music - a direction hinted at with the rockier, huskier rhythms of "Common Sense" - he signed with Asylum who also had something different in mind for Prine.

After giving Asylum the beautiful and somewhat conventional "Bruised Orange," Prine wanted to access the rockabilly and country roots sound he loved as a teenager in Maywood, Ill.

In quick succession, Prine tossed off "Pink Cadillac" and "Storm Windows" (the former recorded in Memphis and produced by the family Phillips - father Sam, brothers Knox and Jerry, the latter recorded at Muscle Shoals and produced by Barry Beckett), a pair of albums that were the antithesis of the slick, shiny SoCal singer/songwriter ethic that Asylum was expecting.

Following "Storm Windows'" 1980 release, Prine and Asylum mutually agreed to end their relationship.

Flirting with the idea of abandoning music altogether, Prine and friend Al Bunetta decided to launch their own independent label, Oh Boy Records, named after the Buddy Holly song. Beyond the control and self-serving advice of the major label system, Prine suddenly began to enjoy some modest yet honest commercial success.

After the heartening sales of his initial Christmas single, Prine recorded the well-regarded "Aimless Love" in 1984 and followed it up with the bluegrass-tinged "German Afternoons" in 1986.

"German Afternoons" earned Prine his very first Grammy nomination, a feat he then matched with his first live album, entitled appropriately enough "John Prine Live," two years later.

By this time, Prine was ready for a breather. His second marriage had just dissolved and, weary of upper level label shenanigans, he had rebuked a Sony offer to buy Oh Boy. After touring to support the live album, Prine withdrew for awhile to consider his options.

In 1991, Prine decided to pursue the path that Asylum had tried to force on him 10 years before. He hooked up with Heartbreakers bassist Howie Epstein and concocted a well-produced, star-studded pop/folk album, "The Missing Years."

The title referred to the song "Jesus, the Missing Years," where Prine postulated what Christ might have been up to between puberty and crucifixion, but it might just as easily have been a sly reference to his recent predilection for taking longer and longer times between albums.

"The Missing Years" was a stone cold hit. The album notched sales of 250,000 units, a phenomenal amount for an indie, and Prine was nominated for his third Grammy, this time taking the win for Best Contemporary Folk Album.

Four years later, Prine and Epstein hooked up again for "Lost Dogs & Mixed Blessings," garnering good reviews and yet another Grammy nod.

By this time, Prine had married his third wife, Fiona, who he had met while touring in Ireland in the late '80s. By the time Prine was touring to support "Lost Dogs," he had become a first-time father at the age of 49; a second child arrived 10 months later.

Prine conceived the idea for "In Spite of Ourselves" and set out to realize his vision when the cancer diagnosis momentarily derailed his life and career.

Fate intervened once again, as George Strait took his version of Prine's "I Just Want to Dance With You" to number one on the country charts, the royalties for which more than covered Prine's medical expenses. He finished the acclaimed "In Spite of Ourselves" and was surprised at the warm reception that it received.

"I didn't expect people to hate it, but I didn't expect them to embrace it like they did just because it only had one song on it that I wrote," says Prine. "I thought, 'You can't get away with that.' But when people liked it as much as they did, I felt really good because a project like that every once in awhile really keeps you fresh. You play music because you like to and not because you want to show off your latest song. There's a lot of songs I like to sing, and I like to sit around with buddies and just play. I'd like to be able to make another record like that sometime and to think that that one got accepted is really good. I won't take advantage of it and do it too often, but every once in awhile."

In 2000, Prine covered his own songs on "Souvenirs"; it had been 5 years since "Lost Dogs," the last full album of Prine originals. When Prine finally began working on new songs, he found the going a little choppier than his previous writing sessions.

"Man, after I had the first three songs wrote, it seemed like an eternity before four, five and six came along," says Prine with a laugh. "I've got kids, they're 9 and 10 now, but when I did "(Lost Dogs"), that's when they were born. I stayed on the road for almost two years with 'Lost Dogs,' and by the time I got time to be around them regularly, I got so used to it that the calendar and the clock went out the window."

Since starting Oh Boy in the early '80s, Prine has not had to adhere to the industry's cyclical template of album/tour/repeat and enjoyed the luxury of knowing his fan base will turn out for shows whether he has new music or not.

"I'm the only one who put pressure on to put a record out," says Prine. "Then when you do put a record out, people can't wait to say, 'When's the next one?' Anyway, I finally got enough songs that I felt real comfortable with - I sang them in concert plenty - and this is the first time I produced myself. So I'm real happy with the way the record turned out, as long as it did take."

Part of "Fair & Square's" delay is a matter of Prine's recently expanded family obligations, which have necessarily altered his songwriting process.

"I'd rather wait for total inspiration," says Prine with a laugh. "I would rather be driving down the street and go, 'Man I got a song,' and stop the car and write it down because I know those are the best ones. And I used to do those every couple of months, knock one out like that...In order to write, I've got to sit down and make a time for it and say that's what I'm going to do. The odd song will come along where you can't resist writing it, but if I waited for 10 of those, I might be 85 before the next album."

For Prine, having children was one of the most unexpected and fulfilling experiences of his life. He credits his wife and sons with offering him a perspective on life that he might never have known otherwise.

"I had no idea what having kids would do. Nobody could have told me what it would do for me," says Prine. "I've never been this grounded. I like to strive for being grounded and to set up scenes that are in a room, and there's an ashtray and a chair, and there's the person, the character. But that isn't how all life looks to me because life has looked really strange to me. The kids have really grounded me, and I feel like a normal person. I actually get up in the morning, and I feel tired at night."

Between life and Prine's slower than normal writing pace, it took awhile to amass the material for "Fair & Square."

This album finds Prine working with more collaborators than he's ever worked with on a single album, including Pat McLaughlin, Keith Sykes, Roger Cook and Donnie Fritts; he also included covers of A.P. Carter's "Bear Creek Blues" and Red Foley's "Clay Pigeons."

Once he'd road-tested most of it and was ready to hit the studio, Prine decided he'd have a crack at producing himself."On 'In Spite of Ourselves,' I gave myself a co-producer credit with Jim Rooney," says Prine. "But Jim made everything so easy it just seemed like I helped. It wasn't until I produced myself that I found out how hard it is."

To that end, Prine enlisted the services of Gary Paczosa, who he had met in Ireland when he was touring with Iris DeMent. Prine had been impressed by Paczosa's work with Alison Krauss and Nickel Creek, and when Paczosa inquired about the possibility of working together sometime, Prine agreed and then contacted him at the outset of "Fair & Square."

"Gary just took over with the sound," says Prine. "He would take everything and say, 'Do you like this? Do you like what you're doing? Okay, now let me work on it.' Man, he would get sounds out of my acoustic guitar that would add $10,000 to the price of it."

The sessions were further complicated by the fact that Prine was still finishing material for the album.

"I had to jump back and forth between being the writer and artist and producer," says Prine. "And the record company needing the record about three years ago. There's always different hats to wear."

In the end, "Fair & Square" is simply another great John Prine album, filled with inescapable truths, inscrutable wisdom and goofball humor. These days, Prine's songs are less character driven and more centered on personal-yet-universal observations, but they still bear the distinct signature of John Prine's voice and viewpoint and soul.

And, oddly enough, after three and a half decades of doing this very thing for a living, Prine still has very little insight into the mechanics of how it works for him.

"If I did know where I got the inspiration from, believe me, I'd move there. I'd buy a house there," says Prine, laughing. "I probably know less than I thought I knew 30 years ago. There's a whole lot I don't know about the creative process."

"When I get around to writing and it's no effort whatsoever, which it usually isn't once you get into it, I've learned to not stop halfway or three-quarters of the way through something and say you'll pick it up tomorrow."

"There's nothing harder than picking that up later; you don't know how you got into it. It's like a little puzzle, and you have to retrace to see where the beginning of the puzzle is. And it's very difficult to get into that head to write that third verse or that bridge for something you started six months earlier. It's easier when you co-write because I think most people come from a craftsmanship sort of way of doing it, whereas when I write alone, I have no rules. I just go for it or I don't. I go for a hot dog, or I go for a song."

Photo by John Chiasson