Cincinnati, Ohio’s Mary Kate and Trashley has adopted a somewhat unusual and confusing moniker. Is it a female rap duo? A wrestling tag team? Is it a disgruntled former child actor taking a pot-shot at their estranged sibling? In some deep recess of his personality, adopting the moniker made either practical or comedic sense to songwriter Alexander Scaglia who recorded his debut EP — interestingly enough a solo effort — in 2018. Like the tongue-in-cheek punks who’ve come before him, the moniker is likely to draw both amused attention and/or indignant demands of “Cut, It, Out” (how rude!). Which scenario is more likely? It is difficult to predict. However, assurances that the record is a gloriously fun garage rock rager are far easier to make.

Comprised solely of Scaglia, a multi-instrumentalist who handles guitar, bass, drums, synthesizers, lead vocals, and even his own BGVs, Mary Kate and Trashley is the second of Scaglia’s bands to make their label home at Ohio-based indie record label Poptek Records. His previous band, The Florals, issued two LPs via Poptek and his former bandmate Brenna Myers leant a helping hand in the recording of this EP, titled Makes A Record. Isaac Karms (Marble Garden Recording Studio) and Scaglia also handled recording duties.

At its core, Makes A Record is an amalgam of well-formed ideas, happy accidents, odd experiments and pleasing sounds that establish Scaglia as one to be watched in Southwest, Ohio, which has long been a fertile breeding ground for extraordinary garage rock phenomena. If you’re looking for this kind of close encounter, Makes A Record is Scaglia’s “You got it dude!”

Label Site