Colvin, Hiatt have seen the lows and they're still singing.

Byline: Serena Markstrom The Register-Guard

In the crudest sense, Saturday's show at the McDonald Theatre features a couple of alcoholics and former depressives singing songs about their struggles. But, you know, many shows in the genre would fit that description, give or take the word "former."

Both Shawn Colvin and John Hiatt are heralded songwriters who critics and fans in the know think should be selling billions of albums - but who are still a few inches shy of being directly in the public eye.

Songcraft and an impeccable singing voice don't necessarily make you a huge star. Then, Colvin's music isn't made for that. Hers is intimate music, meant for a relatively small, seated crowd to mull over, thinking of their own divorces, diseases and depressions.

But perhaps the most compelling reason to listen to Colvin's honest messages and personal songs is the hope that flickers around in all that reflection.

About the same time Colvin was getting going in her music career, some 25 years ago, she kicked an alcohol habit that she had acquired in college.

"I used to get drunk to get my spark," she sang in "The Facts About Jimmy," a track on "A Few Small Repairs," her breakthrough album that con- tained the 1998 Grammy song of the year, "Sunny Came Home." "And it used to work just fine/ It made me wretched but it gave me heart/ I miss Jimmy like I miss my wine."

It's hard to believe Colvin is 51. Her triathlon training no doubt contributes to the youthful appearance, but her mug is likely brightened as well by all the bad stuff she's gotten over.

Colvin describes her latest, "These Four Walls," released in 2006, as a coming-of-age album. The All Music Guide says it's a record of ups and downs, "about taking responsibility and surviving one's mistakes. ...

` `These Four Walls' is an achievement, another step on a gloriously rocky road that is far from its end."

Hiatt always a critical favorite

Colvin's co-headliner is another artist whose fame has never quite lined up with the respect he gets from critics.

Hiatt's solo career began around the same time that Colvin started drinking, in the mid-1970s. He didn't hit the charts until 1987, with "Bring the Family," which included the song "Thing Called Love." By then he had refined his style to what the All Music Guide calls a "rootsy fusion of rock 'n' roll, country, blues and folk."

In 1985 - after putting out several records on two labels, finding no commercial success and living through the suicide of his first wife - Hiatt entered rehabilitation for his alcohol addiction.

After "Bring the Family," some of his older material was rereleased, but his chart suc- cess didn't improve. He was, according to the AMG, officially a cult favorite.

Colvin has put her name behind a pharmaceutical-spon- sored campaign to raise awareness about depression. There's not as much public evidence Hiatt has banished his demons as effectively as has Colvin, but he's been steadily releasing albums and touring throughout.

His latest projects came out in 2005: "Master of Disaster," and CD and DVD versions of "Live from Austin, TX."

In his 2003 album, "Beneath This Gruff Exterior," Hiatt sings, "Some people call it depression, I call it a song/ Don't worry about me, I'm not going to be around all that long."

Somehow, we don't believe him.

CONCERT PREVIEW

Shawn Colvin, John Hiatt

What: Singer-songwriters

When: 8 p.m. Saturday

Where: McDonald Theatre, 1010 Willamette St.

Tickets: $27 general, $44 reserved