David Lowery has always kept his wits about him. It drove both Camper Van Beethoven and Cracker and it fuels his first solo album ever so subtly. His right-hand man Johnny Hickman plays “exactly four guitar licks” according to Lowery, so it’s mostly Lowery and the members of his recording studio in Virginia filling out the musical space. “Baby, All Those Girls Meant Nothing to Me” is a rabble-rousing piece of guitar-power. “Ah You Left Me” takes a broken heart and turns it into a piece of acoustic balladry that’s halfway to Paul Westerberg and the Church’s Steve Kilbey. “Raise ‘Em Up On Honey” is country poker. The title track whispers and claws with a Southern rock that evokes the feeling of old Pavement records. “Big Life” is one of the late Mark Linkous of Sparklehorse’s final appearances on tape. “I Sold the Arabs the Moon” is a history lesson of sorts in waltz-time.