Album Review: Spells

If you do not have the privilege of seeing the Happy Hollows live, Spells is the next best thing. Yes, it’s their debut album, but don’t let that fool you. They’re already notorious in the LA scene for their almost barbaric live shows. Sarah Negahdari’s wild woman persona fits in well with Chris Hernandez’s edgy, primal drumming and Charles Mahoney’s driving bass lines.

The fourteen-track album includes a few songs from their previous EPs, including “Monster Room and “A Man, A Plan, A Canal”. The difference between the old and new tracks is apparent, especially because the band’s influences are more obvious on their older tracks. The opening guitar lick to “A Man, A Plan, A Canal” could easily be mistaken for a track on a Sleater-Kinney album. However, newer tracks such as “Faces” prove that the band is growing into its own unique sound. Spells takes the unique qualities produced by each member of the band and ties them together to create a cohesive and developed sound; the drumming compliments the outlandish guitar solos and focuses on putting logic into their mad sound.

Negahdari’s guitar rips through the opening track “Faces.” This is the Happy Hollow’s call-to-arms, an introduction that sounds more like a mission statement for a band who has clearly discovered itself. As Negahdari sings: “Misunderstanding, I just figured out/You can’t escape what you carry around”, the backing vocals rise, elevating the chorus to new heights.

Other highlights include “High Wire.” Although the band has never used synths before this album, the keyboard intro finds a good home inside the Happy Hollows sound. As the song ends, the synths cleverly spiral into a haunting requiem-like outro. “Turtle and Hare”, a slower, darker track inspired by Sonic Youth circa Murray Street fuses Negahdari’s ghostly voice with her mysterious lyrics. Using water as a metaphor for recovering from a break-up, Negahdari skillfully molds a children’s fairytale into a mature introspection on human vulnerability. “Things are not what they appear to be,” the band seems to tell us. The album cover of Spells may feature a few harmless trees, but what’s inside the album is nothing close to harmless.