In 'Bored Games,' Matt Jasper's move is to the city

For his third album, "Bored Games," Matt Jasper wanted to tap into his own experiences - of being a 20-something moving from Merrick to the city for the first time.

"It's about living on your own, about moving from looking for a relationship to being in one, about the transition into adulthood," Jasper says. "It's definitely a larger trend moving away from Long Island to the city or even to other states. And there's an even larger issue about moving from any suburb to a big city. But my own experiences are definitely reflected in this work."

Jasper describes his songs as "indie pop-rock from a singer-songwriter perspective" and those detailed singer-songwriter stories are on display in "Brooklyn Heights," where he sings of running out of hot water, keeping out the rats and moving from Babylon to Brooklyn Heights to start his career. Jasper taps into a classic chorus on "Ordinary People," where he sounds closest to influences such as Ben Folds and Ben Kweller.

His distinctive voice, combined with more straightforward singer-songwriter backdrops on "No Secret" or "Amanda," builds a tension that's kind of like David Byrne singing Jason Mraz songs, an odd, seemingly ill-advised pairing, that Jasper makes work.

It's a combination that Jasper has been working on over his previous albums and in the two years it took for him to write "Bored Games," which he will release March 2 on his own label, as he has with his previous two albums, and support with area shows starting March 12 and a tour of the Northeast in the spring.

"I have the knowledge to do this all myself," says Jasper, who works on music licensing for the Harry Fox Agency. "But we'll see what happens."

Contact The Long Island Sound at glenn.gamboa@newsday.com or follow @ndmusic on Twitter.