Last week I was scouring the Best New Albums list at Pitchfork.com. Digging down into the second page, I came across an interesting review for “Rips” by Ex Hex, a female trio from Washington, DC. I’d never heard of them, but I listened to a couple of sample songs, liked what I heard, and bought the album as a download. As I listened, I also checked out the band’s website and Instagram feed. Among the Instagram images that I viewed was a video of guitarist Mary Timony roller skating (see below).
The very next day I spoke to my daughter Molly who is now based in Portland, OR, pursuing her career as a filmmaker. She filled me in on her recent gigs, including working on a music video … for a band called Ex Hex. If that wasn’t enough of a coincidence, she said that they had filmed at a roller rink. I mentioned seeing the Instagram video, and Molly said “Really? I remember them shooting that clip with a phone as I was walking past.” So I went back and looked at the clip, and sure enough, there’s Molly walking past on the right!
Of course, I realize now that the Portland connection isn’t entirely random. Mary Timony’s previous band was Wild Flag, which included Carrie Brownstein – who is now perhaps most famous as co-creator and co-star of the TV series Portlandia. But that’s still a bit of a stretch for a band from DC to pick Portland as a place to film the first video from their new album. Of course, Portland is an increasingly a cool place for filmmaking, especially with the recent addition of my kid to the scene.