Schmoon is the inscrutable new moniker of Matt Cascella, formerly of indie-rock duo Brooms and solo endeavour owlbiter. Relocating from NYC to Portland, Maine has brought with it a certain lackadaisical energy which Cascella leans into on this loose, twangy new album of home-spun wisdom and surprising levels of anxiety.

When he hones in on the low-stakes minutiae of everyday annoyances Cascella calls forth a wry observational wit, like the shitty service on ‘Table for One’ or being chased by honeybees on the title track. These songs are peaceful, but have a melancholic tinge, as with the sad state of America that Cascella finds on ‘Sadly County Fair’. He aims for somewhere between Randy Newman in his everyman concerns and Tom Waits in his rasping lilt, and generally falls somewhere between and short, but the ambition shows great promise. Perhaps a little Warren Zevon?

Cascella’s voice is well-suited to close-hewn character studies like the creepy tale of domestic violence on ‘Not a Girl’ and the return from agoraphobia into society on ‘Made It Up’. He snarls his way around a harsh lyric like “this is what is love is…kind of” and just about nails a weird, throaty scream to really sell the dread that just venturing to the end of your garden can induce.

Pretty Darn Pretty is mostly drawn in browns and greys, a uniform musical palette of country/folk/blues sounds, so when the lyrics don’t grab you the whole song can fade into the background, especially when Cascella attempts to wrestle with grander themes like our collective fragility (‘Wait for the Mystery’). While ‘Birthday Pancakes’ is far too jaunty in arrangement and banal in lyrics to really sell the toxicity of the relationship being described.

Guitars ground most of these songs, acoustic generally but with occasional shrieks of electric (‘Made It Up’ in particular). However, extra flourishes help bring the arrangements to life like the banjo on ‘Danny Friend’ that complements the communal idealism or the subtle brass on ‘Table for One’. The best song on the album is also the only one that’s piano-led, ‘To a Butthead’, which is a brilliant rumination on the fear of death even if it does have a stupid title and an extended metaphor about a pole-dancing mouse.

Despite the seemingly low-key vibe of the album, Pretty Darn Pretty has a lot more going on below the surface if you’re willing to indulge a few of Schmoon’s countrified detours.