Un Deux Trois
Lovers EP
(Holidays for Quince Records)

A collection of second-lesson Barre chords and '50s soda-shop drums, Un Deux Trois is a new setting for the voice of Bellafea, Heather McEntire. But simplicity pulls favors for the Lovers EP, the demo-turned-debut of McEntire's collaboration with In the Year of the Pig, Horseback and Mt. Moriah member Jenks Miller.

Over its four tracks, de-emphasized guitars and less-is-more kit work allow McEntire's felt-like tone and post-riot melodies to do all of the impressing. Whether short and peppy ("Janice Says") or steady and dreamy ("Everything That Is Happening Is Happening"), the music steals only a few moments from McEntire, surprisingly sturdy and quite different when her songs aren't the wounded, howling animals of Bellafea's. After she sings the line "I waited like a tower" on the rolling "You Earn Your Enemies," you can't help but dismiss the wayward lover leaving her high and dry. But something in her voice shuns pity. This McEntire could wait forever, and she'd be OK.

That's a strength not necessarily absent on Bellafea albums, but far more visible here. —Robbie Mackey

Un Deux Trois releases Lovers EP Saturday, March 10, at Local 506 with Bowerbirds, Robo Sapien and Sweater Weather. The 10 p.m. show is free.

[Full disclosure: Burly Time Records, which was co-founded by Music Editor Grayson Currin, will release an album by Un Deux Trois drummer Jenks Miller's other band, Horseback. Bowerbirds will release their debut on this label as well.]