How does he do it?

After almost 40 years as a singer-songwriter, how does John Hiatt continue to achieve a standard of songwriting excellence that few others have ever attained?

Indeed, on his latest disc, “The Open Road,” Hiatt continues to stake his claim as one of the finest, most probing, most ingenious pop / rock songwriters of the last four decades.

Hiatt — who comes to town on Sunday for an in-store mini-concert at Borders (which will also be broadcast on the radio) and a sold-out show at The Ark — has always demonstrated a rare talent for crafting pithy, eloquent insights into the human condition expressed with vivid imagery and inspired, sometimes hilarious wordplay.

Over the years, the characters in his songs have often lived hardscrabble lives, or existed on the fringe of society. Others have endured emotionally harrowing experiences. Still others have lived lives of weary resignation — or found redemption in small victories or taken comfort in small pleasures.

Some of his most gripping songs, back when he made his critical and commercial breakthrough in the late ‘80s, looked unflinchingly at the alcoholism that led him to hit bottom in the mid-‘80s -songs he wrote after he got sober and went into recovery.

But he’s always intermingled those more somber scenarios with others that were goofy, funky, deadpan-funny slices of life, like his classic fan favorite, “Memphis in the Meantime,” in which he wrote amusingly of fleeing the glitzy country-pop scene in Nashville and heading for the bluesier, gritty streets of Memphis: “Sure I like country music, and I like mandolins / But right now I need a Telecaster through a Vibro-Lux turned up to ten…..After we get good and greasy, we can come back home / Put the cowhorns back, on the Cadillac / And change the message on the Code-A-Phone…..”

On his last album, “Same Old Man,” from 2008, many of Hiatt’s songs were about the virtues of being in a long, stable relationship. Hiatt was 55 at the time, and was clearly happy, now that his kids had grown up and moved out, to finally have the time and opportunity to rediscover “romance” with his wife of 22 years, Nancy.

On “The Open Road,” however, many of the songs leave domestic bliss behind as his protagonists hits the highway. Several songs sketch out the details of living on the road, for no other reason than to see what’s out there — or just because of a need to keep moving. In that respect, some of the tunes have a Springsteen-like quality, recalling the Boss’s penchant for highway mythology.

Indeed, on the title track, over scorching guitars and a driving, foursquare beat, Hiatt sings, in his signature rangy fashion: “Shrunken head and Mardi Gras beads, hanging on the rear view mirror that bleeds / Keeping her eyes on the open road / No telling where that son-a-bitch goes.” Listen to John Hiatt “The Open Road” (MP3).

But in some songs, the desire to hit the road is spurred by a restless, self-defeating need to escape the stability he celebrated on “Same Old Man” — or something worse.

On “Haulin,’” Hiatt puts his deft storytelling skills to use, holding back a bit of key info until the end. Over a revved-up roots rock groove, Hiatt initially delivers lines that suggest an upcoming cheerful reunion: “Sun comes up and I’m crossin’ Kentucky state line, gonna see my girl.” But later, the song takes a much grimmer turn, when we learn that the singer is fleeing after killing a man: “I cut him and I coasted through Conway / Put him by the side of the road.”

Hiatt has said the title song was the first one he wrote for the album, and that it just set the tone for the disc as a whole. “It has that sense of desperation,” Hiatt recently told CMT.com, “that restlessness that we all have. I like the chorus: ‘The open road where the hopeless come to see if hope still runs.’”

Not all of the songs are about the highway, though. Others explore themes of regret, inner conflict, a need to change, or a weary acceptance of the realities of aging.

But on the final song, “Carry You Back Home,” Hiatt comes full circle, as he again seeks and finds the comforts of home and hearth, singing: “I’ve been sailing a ship of fools / Past steel-eyed buildings and swimming pools / Honey, let me carry you back home.”

As for the music itself, Hiatt and his band expertly and effortlessly plumb the bluesy / roots-rocking / country-rock styles that have generally formed the foundation for his best albums. This time, though, the blues streak runs deeper than on most of his previous discs.

He recorded the album with his road band of the last three years: Doug Lancio on guitar, Patrick O’Hearn on bass and Kenneth Blevins on drums. Lancio tears it up on several tunes, unleashing bristling, crackling guitar fills and solos — and some sweltering slide guitar.

Hiatt and the boys recorded the disc in his home recording studio, in the garage on his farm, about 30 minutes from Nashville — only the second disc he’s made there in all these years. And Hiatt produced the record himself, going with a spare, stripped-down sound, played live in the studio, with almost no overdubs or other instruments.

“It’s learn as you earn,” Hiatt told the Orlando Sentinel, referring to his production experience and style. “I’ve spent the last 30 years sort of gathering up a bunch of old gear and stuff, and I’ve spent all these years making records and peering over engineer’s shoulders, learning from producers.

“I figured it was time, and I (had) a great time doing it.” And then he added, in typically self- deprecating fashion: “It’s not rocket science. I didn’t really do much with it.”

Kevin Ransom, a free-lance writer who covers music for AnnArbor.com, previously wrote about John Hiatt in 1991, 1996, 2002 and 2008. He can be reached at KevinRansom10@aol.com.

John Hiatt performing live in Nashville earlier this year: