Todd Snider couldn’t have picked a more apt title for his current album: “Live: The Storyteller.”

Because, not only does the album feature Snider telling several of his loose, affable, hilariously shaggy stories, but Snider, 44, is also probably one of the best writers of story songs—or, really, any songs—of his generation.

His skills as a storyteller are hard-earned. After he left home as a teenager, and then started playing the folk-music circuit as a young new artist, he spent many years living an existence that he once described as similar to that of “an itinerant hobo.”

That’s certainly one way to live a full, rich interesting life—the kind that lends itself to the sort of adventures that can provide fodder for a great storyteller—whether the tale is funny, raucous, poignant or heart-breaking.

“Yeah, I first began wanting to tell stories when I first started living that lifestyle, and sometimes, the stories were easy to remember because they were true,” says Snider, who comes to The Ark for a solo show on Friday. “But, then, you start applying some craft, and start embellishing a little, like maybe giving yourself a better one-liner in the story than you actually delivered in the real situation.”

Indeed, storytelling is also a skill that needs to be honed, and Snider definitely put his time in on that front, studying the masters—John Prine, Shel Silverstein, Randy Newman, Ramblin’ Jack Elliott and Jerry Jeff Walker among them. In fact, Prine even served as a mentor for Snider for a time, signing him to his Oh Boy! label in the 1990s, and taking him out on tour as his opening act.

“So, when I sit down and write, I often have those guys in my head,” says Snider during a phone interview from his home in East Nashville. “I’ll think, ‘Now, if I was to play this for John, or Shel, or Newman, what would they think of it?”

It’s true that many of Snider’s best-loved songs over the years have been funny and or sardonic, like “America’s Favorite Pasttime,” or “The Tale of Two Fraternity Brothers,” or “Conservative Christian Right Wing Republican Straight White American Male.”

But on the other hand, Snider has always shown sympathy for the underdog, or for those who live on the margins of society. Some of his songs are heart-rending examinations of hard-luck cases, or the poignancy of lives-gone-wrong - or empathetic explorations of how people cope by closing off after they’ve been hurt or beat down too many times.

“Storyteller” is a double album that collects 24 of his best songs. “I wanted to pull together the ones that the lyrics that I was most pleased with,” says Snider—including “Greencastle Blues,” “Just Like Old Times,” “East Nashville Skyline,” “The Devil You Know,” and two of the above-mentioned tunes (“Fraternity Brothers” didn’t make the cut).

But for many fans, the highlights of the album are Snider’s between-song stories. One, the more-than-8-minute long “KK Rider Story” is a hilarious tale about an overly rambunctious fan and “about being in the right place at the right time.” Another is a similarly funny recounting of the night that he “met” NASCAR driver Bill Elliott, and the “Rose City” story is a partly-sheepish tale of nostalgia, set against the backdrop of his going back to his home state of Oregon for a show.

“Since I like to tell stories, and since I’ve studied guys like Prine and Jack, I figure that an album like this would be a good one for a guy like me to release, for listeners to hear that other side of the artist. I do think a show is cooler if the artist talks more. I really did ‘take lessons’ on that from John, and Jack, and Arlo Guthrie as well.”

In fact, a couple of artists that Snider is often compared to are not songwriters, but comics—namely, Bill Hicks and Mitch Hedberg, now both deceased. “Hicks was a big influence, but I lean on him more in my songs than I do in my stories. And while I love Mitch’s work, I don’t know if he was an ‘influence,’ because I think I was talking like a stoner onstage before he was,” cracks Snider.

While Snider has written many songs with political themes, and refers to himself as a “flaming liberal,” he issues this disclaimer at every show: "I didn't come here to change anybody's mind, and if I give you my opinion, it's only because it rhymed."

“I definitely am politically minded, but I just don’t like folk singers telling me what to do or how to think,” explains Snider.

Having said that, Snider says that his next album will be titled “Agnostic Hymns,” and that one song takes on the military-industrial-complex. “It’s gonna be an anti-country, anti-religion, anti-family album,” quips Snider—“you know, a real ‘pick-me-up.’”

In the meantime, Snider recently began “giving away” a six-song EP, titled “S--t Sandwich,” a jokey disc wherein Snider portrays a musical alter ego he has dubbed Elmo Buzz, backed by a band called the East Side Bulldogs. “Elmo is a character I once wrote a short story about—he’s this delusional East Nashville guy who is obsessed with Hank Williams, Jr., and all the songs about chicks, cars, partying hard and East Nashville references.”

“It has the sonics of a 1963 record—a full band, with two electric guitars—with me playing lead -- plus a sax, a piano and drums. Actually, no one really likes it,” says Snider with a laugh, referring to his friends and the people with his management company. “That’s why we’re giving it away.”

Kevin Ransom, a free-lance writer who covers music for AnnArbor.com, has previously interviewed Todd Snider several times for the Ann Arbor News and AnnArbor.com, dating back to 2002. He can be reached at KevinRansom10@aol.com.