The Spells

Featuring both Mary Timony (Helium) and Sleater-Kinney's Carrie Brownstein, this collaborative effort offers pretty much what you'd expect from a pair of such sharp, kinetic, and creative popsters. Plunky, dissonant guitars weave a straight line, leaving plenty of room for blending voices to cause longterm hook infection. Timony's cohort Ash Bowie (Polvo) could've played guest guitar here -- the songs sound like a mix of current Blonde Redhead and Polvo's "Flower of Forgiveness." Darkly charming in a neener-neener sort of way, their collaborative EP entitled The Age of Backwards comes courtesy of K Records -- an appropriate home for such sparse, effective, and classy songwriting.