There was an old sketch in the first season of That Mitchell and Webb Look – a spin-off of the similarly named radio show by Peep Show stars David Mitchell and Robert Webb – called 'Angel Summoner and BMX Bandit'. The premise was simple: they were a pair of superheroes, one with the power to summon a celestial horde, the other with some wicked BMX skillz. It was kinda funny.

There is, I reckon, a danger that Return to the Moon, the debut album from El Vy could be preconceived as something similar. I suspect I’m not alone in being excited by the presence of Matt Berninger, frontman of The National, rather than Ramona Falls and Menomena alumnus Brent Knopf. I’ll enter the disclaimer here: I’m not the most au fait with his music, but then I’m not sure that matters too much, as his contribution is an enormous factor in this album standing alone as one this year’s most enjoyable.

The album’s near-titular opener, ‘Return to the Moon (Political Song for Didi Bloome to Sing, with Crescendo)’, is a neat signifier as to what you’re getting from this not-so-secret meeting. The combination of Berninger’s baritone – here at its most playful – and Knopf’s skittering afrobeat guitar create something reminiscent of a lighter, less ominous version of the opening track on Alligator.

This isn’t to say that Return to the Moon is merely The National-lite, rather that Berninger brings the same qualities to this alternative venture. His voice lends gravitas and emotional heft, while his wry lyrics continue to subvert that: “I've never been so alone/'Til I read that The Minutemen were dead,” is his knowing, repeated refrain on ‘It’s a Game’.

Peak Berninger though is the album’s second track, ‘I’m the Man to Be’; “I'll be the one in the lobby in the green-colored fuck me shirt” he sings, with the by-now obligatory onanism reference, “I’m peaceful ‘cause my dick’s in sunlight” goes the awkward-to-sing-along-to chorus. Only on the gloriously beautiful ‘No Time to Crank the Sun’ does he go for straight up earnestness.

Return to the Moon is far from being solely Berninger’s album though; quite the opposite. Knopf’s experimental indie pop (is that an oxymoron?) is all over it, from the delicate guitars on lead single ‘Paul is Alive’, the dark bassy electronics of ‘Happiness, Missouri’ or the shifts in tone on the aforementioned ‘No Time to Crank the Sun’. What he brings is a levity that is rarely present when it comes to The National. More importantly – and I’m aware of the wrath I risk invoking here – his brings the variety that was missing on Trouble Will Find Me, a collection of 8/10 songs that made a 7/10 album.

Often when a band’s nominal leader brings out a side project in a similar genre it can highlight what the other band members bring to the table; looking back, Thom Yorke’s The Eraser, while decent, sounds like a skeleton version of In Rainbows. The great strength of El Vy, by contrast, is that it brings forth both members’ strengths to create something that sounds like a proper polished debut from a 'real' band.