"Live," featuring harmonica player Jerry Fierro, kicks things off with the kind of loose-limbed swagger that recalls the Faces on a good night — all elbows and grins, nothing overthought. Fierro's harp doesn't decorate the track so much as argue with it, needling the vocal line until the whole thing threatens to fall apart, which of course it never does. That tension between abandon and control is the record's real trick, and it's there again on "Losing My Mind," where guitarist Lance Doss trades the swagger for something leaner and more urgent, his solo arriving less as ornament than as punctuation.

The rhythm section deserves its own paragraph and rarely gets one. Drummer Steve Holley and bassist Paul Page have logged decades apiece with Paul McCartney, Elton John, Ian Hunter and Dion, and it shows in the way they refuse to hurry. Nothing on this EP rushes toward its chorus; it walks there, confident the song will still be worth hearing when it arrives. That's a harder trick than it sounds, and younger bands chasing the same territory would do well to study how much space Holley leaves around his snare hits.

The prize here, though, is the previously unreleased "Somebody's Always Doin' Something 2 Somebody (Uncut Mix)," restored to its full, unedited length after last year's single edit. Keyboardist Jeff Levine gets the run of the track, piano and B-3 organ trading blows like two old friends arguing about nothing in particular, and the extra minutes do exactly what a good uncut mix should: they let the groove breathe until you forget you were ever waiting for the chorus to return.

Recorded at Shorefire Studios in New Jersey with Joe DeMaio adding guitar solos to "Superstar" and "Shadow Walk," then mastered by Leon Zervos — whose credits include Crowded House and Pink — the EP sounds warm without sounding vintage-obsessed, which is its own small achievement. Too much roots rock reaches for the past as a security blanket; this reaches for it as a toolkit, borrowing the muscle of classic songwriting without bothering to fake the tape hiss.

None of this is music trying to reinvent itself. DownTown Mystic know their lane — hooks built for the highway, choruses built for singing along with the windows down — and they drive it with the ease of people who've made this trip before. "Superstar" and "Shadow Walk" both lean on DeMaio's guitar work to punch through the mix, while the closing stretch of the EP eases off the throttle just enough to remind you this is meant to be a journey, not a sprint.

Is it ambitious? Not especially, and it doesn't need to be. *Mystic Highway Road Trip* sets out to soundtrack six songs' worth of open highway and does exactly that, with musicianship sturdy enough to reward a second listen and hooks generous enough to earn a first. Put the windows down. This one was built for it.