Hey, have you been waiting for a new Ex Hex album? It’s real, and It’s Real is also the title of the second-ever record from Mary Timony’s trio with Betsy Wright and Laura Harris.
The moderately long-awaited follow-up to 2014’s Rips arrives March 22 from Merge and is produced by the same person, Jonah Takagi—but don’t expect to hear exactly the same sound. Today’s first single “Cosmic Cave” is especially bright and crunchy, with a wormhole tremor of garage-pop distortion tempered by the plaintive sincerity of Timony’s vocals.
While they haven’t released much in the way of new music in the past few years (except a cover song), the members of Ex Hex haven’t lain dormant. Wright’s other project Bat Fangs released a quite fun self-titled album last year; Harris has been playing with the band Death Valley Girls; and Timony toured behind re-released recordings from her ’90s band Helium, as the trio told Fader in a recent short interview.
Will this latest album, like practically everything else Mary Timony has ever touched, also become a modern cult classic? Listen to “Cosmic Cave” and check out the ’80s arcade-style artwork and full tracklist for It’s Real below. Ex Hex will tour behind the new album in the U.S. and U.K. this April and May.