NASHVILLE, Tenn. – Jaron Lowenstein of Jaron and the Long Road to Love sounds more than a little bitter in his hit single, “Pray for You,” as he prays for bad things to happen to his ex. But that’s only part of his complicated love story.

The rest of it is laid out in his new album, “Getting Dressed In The Dark.”

“There was one relationship that really sticks with me,” he said. “And that’s where most of the songs come from.”

In fact, Lowenstein, 36, dedicates the album, released in June, to his unnamed ex-girlfriend in the liner notes, thanking her and saying that although she was “annoying at times,” he deserves most of the blame and is sorry for hurting her.

“Through help of ... my therapist, we worked it out,” said Lowenstein, grinning.

Then he caught himself.

“Do country people have therapists? It’s such an L.A. thing. You’re talking and it’s not taboo to be like, ‘My therapist and I were talking.’ I don’t know if in the country world you’re allowed to admit that. I have no idea.”

Lowenstein burst onto the pop scene with the 2001 hit “Crazy For This Girl,” sung with twin brother Evan. It was featured on the TV show “Dawson’s Creek.” But success fizzled.

“In 2003, Evan and I decided to take a year off and do some other things. We just wanted a break from the music business, because it can be a love-hate business,” Lowenstein said. “That year turned into six, and in 2009 I said, ‘Evan, I’ve got stories to tell.’ ”

Jaron Lowenstein was living in Los Angeles, working as a screenwriter. Evan wasn’t ready to get back into music, but he encouraged his brother to go solo.

“I wrote probably most of the songs on this album in a two-week period in L.A. before I left and jumped out to Nashville just to get away from the distractions of L.A.,” he said.

“I knew if I was going to start over and I was going to go back to square one and have to get stuff kicked in my face, I was going to have to get away from the comfortable lifestyle that I had built in L.A.”

He started his own label, Jaronwood Records, and Evan stepped in as co-manager. Jaron immediately took to social media to present new music to fans and interact with them nearly every day. Interestingly enough, those fans began to request “Pray For You” at country radio. Lowenstein is comfortable with the genre switch, saying country has gone pop more than he’s gone country.

“I’m just looking for my audience,” he said. “Wherever the people that like songs that are about stories and hold up a mirror to ourselves and tell stories about life and have reflection and honest accounts of relationships, wherever those stories are with the sound that I’m making, then that’s where I am, and right now that’s country.”

Lowenstein now goes by Jaron and the Long Road to Love. He knows it’s confusing, but he has his reasons.

“The idea behind it was to let my listeners know that the songs I’m going to sing and that they’re going to hear from me are all about relationships. They’re all about me and my experiences, where I got it right and where I got it wrong.”

Lowenstein doesn’t know why his road to love has been so long, but he can describe his ideal girl by quoting from his next single, “That’s Beautiful To Me.”

“The second verse in the song has a line that says, ‘You turn every head when you walk into a room, but your kindness and your sweetened soul lingers like perfume,’ ” he said. “That’s what I’m looking for.”