Washington DC alt-rock hotshot Mary Timony has been bashing ears in high style for a couple of decades, previously with Helium, Autoclave and Wild Flag, and now with Ex Hex, whose hit-after-hit debut LP is just deliriously great fun – this has got to be the air-guitar album of the year. Drummer Laura Harris and bassist Betsy Wright join Timony for a power trio that seems intent on celebrating and rejuvenating some of rock’s enduring pleasures: here are 12 succinct, speedy, riff-happy gems smothered in snarling backtalk and shameless, glorious guitar solos. Ex Hex sit somewhere near the middle of a Go-gos/Ramones/Sleater-Kinney Venn diagram, and join latterday power-pop aces like Warm Soda, the Love Triangle and Sheer Mag in making some of the most endlessly repeat-listenable should-be-hits of recent years. From the hurtling clang of Beast; to How You Got That Girl’s gleaming, twirling chorus; to New Kid, with its whiplashing pickslides and turbo-booster solo – these songs will be echoing in your ears long after Rips’ lean, mean 35 mins are over, and very welcome they will be there, too.
