One of the six Necessary Gentlemen of the band’s title is actually a woman, but the deceit stops there—everything else about this latest cadre of bluegrass and folk-inspired artists comes as advertised, and not just because they have a steady gig at the Neutral Ground, or because they open this debut with the standard “Rambler’s Prayer,” or even because one plays a Resonator guitar. Leader Jon Skvarka and his main vocal counterpart, Fefe Byram, have a natural harmony that sounds practically Appalachian, and when you factor in the fiddle, banjo, guitar, and occasional Floyd Cramer-style piano flourishes, you have real country music for real country people—although like so many modern upstarts, the Gentlemen don’t feel the need to repeat tales of powerful trains, heroic workingmen, or even that old standby, death’s lingering presence.

Granted, the Fefe vocal spotlight “Blue Collar Moon” is an ode to simple yet honest men, but there’s no mythologizing, just a sort of wistful pragmatism. Turns out this is also modern music for modern people, lyrically at least, tales of complicated love too self-aware to be from any century but the 21st. The titles tell you all you need to know about that: “Love, Anyway,” “If You Ain’t Using My Heart,” and especially “Broken Hearts Bluegrass Club.” Fools to Stay actually walks the walk when it comes to neo-traditionalism. Or as Fefe sings about one-night stands on “Moon”: “There are few who can set out on their own / Or have the courage to pick up a phone.”