Singer-songwriter Nick Santino has blossomed into quite the solo artist since leaving A Rocket to the Moon in 2013. Where his former band had only hints of the midwest and barely a twinge of country to it, his newest EP is decidedly country. It bears more resemblance to Santino’s short lived sort-of-solo act Nick Santino & The Northern Wind. Under that moniker, Santino released Going Home EP and The Ones You Meet Along the Way: A Collection of Stories from the Road EP in 2013. The records are more electric than his newest EP, but they provide a good transition between his career as a frontman to his career as a solo musician.

Compared to his past alt rock efforts, Savannah is completely stripped back, populated by little more than Santino’s slow strum. The EP is built almost entirely by acoustic guitar and gentle piano, a backdrop which fits Santino’s voice perfectly. Savannah sounds like Santino has cemented himself in whatever sub-genre of country he’s cornering. It isn’t anything like what Brad Paisley or Luke Bryan play, but rather something resembling an acoustic session. The slide guitar and various other instruments of Santino’s 2014 release Big Skies are nowhere to be found. Instead these six quick tracks, which follow up Live in Sao Paulo, a split EP he recorded with The Maine, make a science out simplicity.

The opening track “Rio” is a bright point. The storyline is sweet. Santino paints a picture of eating breakfast in bed and running away to Mexico that puts a smile on any listeners face. It’s a genuine and gentle song that outlines the escapist nature of young love. If Say Anything’s “I Want To Know Your Plans” had a xylophone and a southwestern twinge the two songs could be siblings.

The softness continues for “Madeline,” but by that point the love has died. Sorry for the spoiler. Santino swoons and sadly sings about Madeline in this something of a cookie cutter love song. His rhymes at times are clever, but there isn’t anything strikingly original about the track. Compared to the rest of the EP, there’s a swell of many stringed things and perhaps the odd woodwind that gives the song a much larger presence, but that’s the only thing worth noting. The next song “I Just Wanted You to Know” simplifies the formula again. It continues on the somewhat uninspired break-up song trend. The lyric “I said I was doing fine, but we both know that’s a lie” is a moment in the song when the sentiment is concisely conveyed, but the listener (or at least this listener) wants to be shown not told.

There’s a shift for the second half of the EP. Beginning with “How to Live With a Ghost” Santino really starts to shine. The last few songs shows Santino’s skills as a storyteller in a way the somewhat first few failed to do. “How to Live With a Ghost” impresses more in one song than he has in three. Half a love story, half a ghost story, the track is both touching and heartbreaking. The simple strikes of the piano pair perfectly with the rhyme-heavy lyrics. Where he missed with “Madeline” Santino hits the mark here. It’s pretty clear that the song is about the ghosts of girlfriends past, but Santino managed to take fairly cliched imagery and make it new. Lines like “There’s a ghost in this house / she’s the creak in the floor / she’s the breath on my neck / that I’ve come to ignore” feel more potent than those in “I Just Wanted You to Know.” Later on the repetition of “No, you can’t go away now” has almost this haunted, howling quality as if Santino, not his lost love, is the specter.

Record out December 19th

There something similarly cliche, but renewed about “That Old Corolla.” At first the song feels a little blasé, with its sorrowful lines about growing up, driving around, stealing liquor and feeling “forever young.” However, Santino crafts his thoughts on the loss of youth into stronger sentiments. It isn’t as successful as “How to Live with a Ghost,” but Santino manages to really tap into the foolishness and carefree attitude of youth. He channels it for lines like “we held the summer sun just like a water gun / taking aim at shooting stars” in a way that made yet another song about growing up feel inventive.

Santino ends strong with “Savannah.” The song bares some resemblance to tracks like “Dakota,” “Annabelle” and “Like We Used To” from the A Rocket To The Moon songbook. Over the course of his career, Santino has penned quite a few break-up songs and each feels like the latest version of the last one. “Savannah” is the newest in the line and perhaps the best. Santino carves out the feelings of moving on and getting back to yourself in the simple, but accurate lines, “went for a ride / never felt so alive / for a moment I forgot about time” and “I was waiting to feel your embrace / oh savannah / why did you push me away?” This kind of writing is what has earned Santino his following as he’s strayed further away from his pop rock roots. If he wanders further down the dusty road of country and keeps writing songs like “Savannah” and “How to Live With a Ghost” he’ll have no problem getting people to continue to listen.

-Zoe Marquedant