Through Your Mind

Ex Hex “Hot and Cold”

To the best of my knowledge and memory, Mary Timony is the only notable indie/alt artist of the ’90s who has never ever looked backwards in her career. No reunions and no oldies in her setlists, just a steady stream of new, finite projects. This has a way of obscuring the natural progression of her overall body of work – there’s definitely an internal logic to her evolution. The funny thing is that her new band Ex Hex isn’t much to do with her album Ex Hex from 2005, which filtered grandiose rock through post punk sensibilities, as much as it’s a sensible next step from what she was writing in Wild Flag. The Mary Timony of 2014 has a more relaxed and groovy sound, and is very pop, but in a “early 70s mainstream rock” sort of way. “Hot and Cold” is sly and feels a bit flirty, and moves along a “Sweet Jane”-ish riff with an unapologetic swagger that seems like a pleasant side effect of playing off Carrie Brownstein all the time for a few years.

Buy it from Merge.