It's a roots kind of music weekend with two CD release events featuring some of the best writing of the year on the local scene. They are actually two groups with much in common - Pike 27 and Len's Lounge.

Key members in each band, Dave Purcell and Jeff Roberson, respectively, earlier this year formed a Cincinnati roots music collective, Uprooted Music, which has staged a series of sessions featuring diverse but rootsy bands. Purcell also plays drums for Len's Lounge. Roberson said the groups were hesitant about releasing their CDs at the same time, then decided the more the merrier.

Len's Lounge, anchored by frontman and main singer-songwriter Jeff Roberson, has released ''Road Dogs and Other Train Songs,'' a tremendous country-rock-folk sound with some great storytelling.

This is a re-release of sorts, since Roberson put out a limited release demo under the same title last January. He's added some new songs, cut some superfluous covers, and it now plays as a more cohesive effort.

Roberson says he's influenced by those great storytellers like Guy Clark, Townes Van Zandt and Nick Drake. ''I got a strong affinity for people who just write about things that are going on around them rather than making big worldly statements, without getting too weepy-eyed,'' he said.''

But Roberson can get sentimental. He has a poignant father-son song, ''U.S.S. Wichita,'' a tribute to his dad, a World War II battalion scout and part of the first American patrol to enter Nagasaki after the atomic bomb.

The sound is delightfully hard to pin down. It's richly textured music with country and rock influences mixing with electric and acoustic instruments.

Roberson says Purcell once called his music ''mongrel Americana.''

''I kind of like that. It's vague enough,'' he said.

It is descriptive of Roberson's deep and rugged moody voice, which often sounds like a demented Johnny Cash.

The Len's Lounge CD release party will be 7:30 p.m. Saturday at the Comet, 4579 Hamilton Ave., Northside (no cover).