Mary Timony

Overall, I think her single best song is "XXX" from Pirate Prude, though.

Hole In The Ground
Lucy
XXX
I'll Get You, I Mean It
Pat's Trick
Trixie's Star
Baby's Going Underground
Honeycomb
Superball
What Institution Are You From?
Leon's Space Song
Lady of the Fire
Ancient Cryme
Devil's Tear
Silver Strings
Poison Moon
I Fire Myself
Hour Glass
Dr. Cat
Musik And Charming Melodee

I'm going to hunt down the Helium album. I think it would be interesting to hear her work within a group and without the Phil Spector-like Mark Linkous all over the house.

http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&uid=UIDSUB040401020425571091&sql=Busuf6j2h71l0

http://www.allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&uid=UIDSUB040401020425571091&sql=A1arsa9wgb23d

Diminishing returns, basically.

Search her French radio session performance of ye olde folk song "The Outlandish Knight", "Ligeia" with Team Sleep, and the Hole in the Ground 7" also. Yeah, and Autoclave...

I like the Golden Dove a lot, I think the letdown factor is just that it's very similar to Mountains so it's kinda like Mountains pt. 2. There are some fantastic songs on it though.

Her solo albums are pretty good too, but they don't seem to hit as many highs as she did with Helium.

please be in the age range of 13-18, otherwise, i think lawsuits will be in yr future...

Former Helium frontwoman Mary Timony has signed to Lookout! Records, which will release her new solo album, "Ex Hex," in mid-April. The indie veteran has released two solo albums on Matador Records, also the home of Helium. The most recent was 2002's "The Golden Dove."

Produced by Fugazi drummer Brendan Canty, "Ex Hex" features Timony on guitar and vocals and Devin Ocampo of the Medications on drums. As previously reported, Medications appears on Canty's new live DVD series, "Burn To Shine," which will be released later this month via Trixie.

what ever happened to her?? what made her lose the finely crafted 'dirty Helium' and go into 'rainbow land Helium'?

my guess, the meds.
too much. too much. too much.

i dont know if you've noticed the trend of hipsters going folky, but i think mary was ahead of the game on this one. now she's back to rocking more, so i have a feeling in 2-3 years, indie rock will "rock" once more.

also, i never liked her D&D turn originally but in listening to a lot of the helium b-sides & whatnot, its not an especially new concept with her. you may even consider the sluts & whores of her pirate prude days to be symbolic princesses & witches.

Yes, I think she's attractive too, but this picture bugs me. What the hell is she doing with the headphones there? Cause she's twiddling the bass knob on a Silvertone Twin Twelve amp head. That's not some vintage hi-fi, it's a damn tube guitar amp, and it doesn't have a headphone output... So what the hell is she doing?!

To the majority of people looking at that photo, it's a cute girl listening to music on headphones.

i http://ctomag.com/may16cto/timony1.gif

i http://www.iheartny.com/yourenotthere/waspsnests/6timony.GIF

I'm not really into the Ex Hex album :( The songs are too simple and referential and I'm not crazy about the production. It didn't help that I went back and listened to "Magic City" this weekend, which is so much better.

Heather Phrase (AMG) claims the new record is the closer she got to the Helium sound/atmosphere.

if so, i'm in.

Phares

I'm not really into the Ex Hex album :( The songs are too simple and referential and I'm not crazy about the production. It didn't help that I went back and listened to "Magic City" this weekend, which is so much better.

― Immediate Follower (NA), Monday, October 13, 2014 11:26 AM (19 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

basically agree with this, it's not a bad album but too simplistic and garagey for me i think. willing to give it a couple more tries.

Production-wise it *is* weirdly muddled in places - compare the "Hot & Cold" from the 7" to the album version and it's so much thicker.

New video, this is prob my favorite track on the album: http://vimeo.com/106394455

That video is fuckin' awesome. Alec MacKaye getting laser-blasted!

This track was an iTunes bonus track on the Wild Flag album and *totally* sounds like it could fit on Ex Hex:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o1sEhUNrAKQ

I'm not really into the Ex Hex album :( The songs are too simple and referential and I'm not crazy about the production. It didn't help that I went back and listened to "Magic City" this weekend, which is so much better.

― Immediate Follower (NA), Monday, October 13, 2014 10:26 AM (2 days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Ha, I listened to this yesterday and was surprised at how much I liked it. But I'm not as invested as you are in Mary Timony specifically or this type of thing generally.

very excited to be playing with ex hex and speedy in november :^) RIPS is great

Just listened to the Ex Hex album this morning and really enjoyed it. Love Timony's tone and lead guitar lines.

(Admittedly, I was totally listening for Timony's playing. The songs are pretty simplistic so I guess I'll see how well the album holds up for me over time. Seems like fun right now, though.)

I've completely forgotten to check it out myself! Thanks for the reminder.

this is good!

Album has grown on me a lot. It did seem too simplistic at first, and the guitar tuning is so straightforward and un-Timony-like, but around listen 4-5 it clicked for me. I wonder if the male character in "Waterfall" is the same as the one in "On The Floor." So many ex-boyfriends passed out on the kitchen floor....

Maybe this is obvious but it reminds me of a lot of late 70s/early 80s stuff like the Cars, Blondie, Go-Gos.

My initial take was a Cars/Ramones mashup.

Feel like Jonathan Richman's "Roadrunner" is quoted differently in two tracks too.

I fucking love this Ex Hex album.

I saw Ex Hex last night. Really fun set, played basically the whole record.

this record is definitely a much better version of wild flag

man I totally missed that Timony was part of this band, will investigate

Good livestream at the moment: http://blog.kexp.org/pickathon-2015-video-webcast/

Ex Hex, that is

I once hitched a UK tour with her, trying to think who the band was. That is to say she was with a few people doing the hitching following another band around not that we were hitching following her.
Would be some point towards the end of the 80s anyway.

My 8yo daughter is OBSESSED with Mary T. My fridge is plastered with pictures of her. She has a Spotify playlist which is just Ex Hex and Wild Flag ("but you can just put the LPs on... Your sister has lots more in hers..." "NO").

I'm a Betsy Wright man myself.

Does she know about Helium? Haven't checked Spotify for them.
the xpost livestream set was so cool, kinda laid-back at times, but guitars kept careening over the top, then back to the groove, where I waited for the next payoff (rock kindergarten, teaching me patience). Nice!

I think she has some Helium singles. I'm not sure what she'll make of MT solo. Hearing her absent-mindedly harmonise with the middle eight of "Glass Tambourine" was my Saturday morning highlight of the year.

Anyway, back to Mary.

Mary's songwriting seems to be at its best when she is a band, presumably bouncing off ideas and not being backed by just herself and drums/keys. But if you'd put all the best tracks from her four solo albums together, it would be as good as Helium.

I'm a Betsy Wright man myself.

― Michael Jones, Monday, August 3, 2015 6:10 AM

On Instagram Mary Timony says she is recording a new solo album

🙂

And we’re back

https://marytimony.bandcamp.com/album/untame-the-tiger-2

i like it! very nice minimal arrangement

reminds me (musically not vocally) a bit of The Evens

I like the minimal straight forward pop of that song too. Sometimes she’s too prog & old school art rock for me , but not on that dominoes song

Really nice stuff

2024 tour date tickets go on sale at 10 am ET today

New track, “The Guest”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=780u_kPEXcA

First date of the tour tonight in Baltimore. Sweet, short set, heavy on the new album with two Helium cuts. There were some nerves and a missed lyric cue or two, but a really strong band, having fun up there. Timony’s solos on “The Guest” were especially on fire.

See ‘em when they come to your town

I was there too. I liked Anna on the pedal steel, but must confess to get bored at times by Timony and Betsy leisurely jamming on so many songs . Felt like circa 1972 rock with not enough energy and rhythm. I liked Timony vocals and how songs started but some just didn’t hold my attention. Maybe I am not the ideal audience member for this tour.

getting bored

Yeah, the jamming was definitely the point to a large degree - the vocals acting as a starting point/tee for glassine guitar riffs and extended vamps. Not for everyone, but it’s possible that this will change as the tour proceeds and she gets more comfortable in the role of singer/bandleader/guitarist - with Hammered Hulls she just had to be the bassist, which was probably a relief.

The openers were OK but I was kinda patiently waiting for the main event - it’s always been that way but even more so as I age.

I get that. I had seen them before and kinda liked them, so was fine with seeing em again even on a midweek work night. But yeah, was glad there weren’t too many delays.

Birthday Girl are a good band but as I was texting some friends during that set:

“They make me a little nostalgic for a time when I listened to a lot of music like this (in a different century, mostly)”

I hear Birthday Girl DC as a throwback to one style from the last century, and Mary Timony’s current live approach a musical throwback to an even earlier style ( even if both of them are using lyrics that relate to their own 21 century issues)

I like the Mary Timony album better than I liked the live show. The guitar vamps don't go on as long.

At one point, Mabel Canty (before I knew her full name) announced their parents were actually accompanying them on tour, and I was like "aw, that's so sweet - every parent should be like that" and then someone informed me who their parents were - had no idea!

wau

lol her bassist is Isabella MacKaye

That is Alec Mackaye's daughter. Mabel Canty is 16 . Mary Timony gave Mabel Canty some lessons and produced their music