Ex-Hex – It’s Real review

There’s a long list of THINGS YOU THINK YOU’LL NEVER WRITE in rock and roll; it’s a world that never seems to run out of surprises for everyone from the uninitiated to the grizzled veteran.

And yet, in typing out that one of the major influences on Ex-Hex’s second album was Robert John “Mutt” Lange, he of production duties for AC/DC, Bryan Adams and Def Leppard, there’s yet more proof that what you sometimes put can still confound.

This is Ex-Hex, right? All girl power rock trio led by Washington DC scene veteran Mary Timony, yeah? And yet so it is. It’s Real isn’t full of cock rock innuendo, pounding reverb and electronic drum fills, something of a relief given that Leppard’s Lange-helmed Hysteria seemed inescapable for about fifteen years, but it does up ante in terms of sinew from their 2014 debut, Rips.

When they get it right, such as on opener Tough Enough and the perfectly crafted Medley, there’s a real sense of throttling up, but in hailing Lange and the permed jocks that followed him, also of a band not taking themselves too seriously.

You can read the full review here.