Last month the Los Angeles singer Inara George released two very different albums with two different groups that were both kind of deliberately short and breezy (each only 30 minutes long), conceptually derivative, and both nonetheless very enjoyable. One was Interpreting the Masters Volume 1: A Tribute to Daryl Hall and John Oates by the duo she’s best known for fronting, The Bird And The Bee, and the other was Love To Live, the debut album from a trio of singers known as The Living Sisters.

Interpreting the Masters Volume 1 comes on the heels of years of coolness rehab for Hall & Oates, who were pretty painfully uncool for a couple decades after their initial run of pop hits, before people remembered how great those songs are. The Bird And The Bee aren’t really interested in making H&O hip or edgy, though; multi-instrumentalist Greg Kurstin was a member of ‘90s alt-rock footnotes Geggy Tah, and the electro pop that B&B release on Blue Note Records is so slick and plush it’s funny to think how up in arms people ever were about Norah Jones recording for the label. So the covers on Interpreting are almost as smooth and radio-friendly as the originals, with the cool calm vocals of Inara George making little effort to channel those of Daryl Hall, arguably the funkiest white man of the ‘70s (although my personal nominee for that title would be her own father, Lowell George of Little Feat).

But mostly Interpreting feels like a cool cruise through the oldies because there’s no air of diehard fandom, no deep cuts being rescued from obscurity -- most of the songs covered hit #1, and the only one that missed the top 10 was the early breakthrough hit “She’s Gone.” Instead, it's a straight up celebration of pop music, as indicated by the title and content of the album's one original song, “Heard It On The Radio,” which deserves some credit for the fact that I didn’t easily pick it out as not a H&O composition (although it's not quite a pastiche, or at least not a particularly accurate one), and that I get it stuck in my head as often as any of the classic hits here after listening to the album. I’m curious if the Volume 1 in the title is tongue and cheek and this is really a one-off, or if The Bird And The Bee will be doing more covers albums. My nomination for the next installment would be Van Halen, since the DLR tribute “Diamond Dave” was my favorite track on last year’s Ray Guns Are Not Just The Future, and George’s family probably received more royalties for 5150’s cover of Little Feat’s “A Apolitical Blues” than for most of her father’s actual records.

The Living Sisters are George’s side project with two other L.A.-based singer/songwriters, Eleni Mandell, who’s released several solo records including last year’s fantastic Artificial Fire, and Becky Stark of the band Lavender Diamond, who I’ve never heard. I wasn’t really sure what to make of them at first, assembling a vaguely retro harmony group and wearing matching outfits. And though the opening track “How Are You Doing?” camps it up a little bit, they mostly sidestep doing some kind of goofball Pipettes-type schtick and just sing really gentle, pretty doo wop and country balladry. Mandell’s smoky voice lends songs like “Ferris Wheel” and “Hold Back” enough character that they feel like more than genre exercies, and gorgeous harmonies on songs like “Blue” will probably make this an album I’ll continue coming back to over the next few months. I had a moment the other day listening to “Cradle” while holding my son in my arms that was kind of perfect. The bonus track on my copy, a cover of “Starman,” however, is so irritating that I hope George isn’t planning an Interpreting The Masters volume of David Bowie songs.

On top of the two group albums George just released, she also put out a solo album less than 6 months ago. Accidental Experimental is kind of a humble little collection of leftover songs and a few alternate versions of songs from her 2008 album with Van Dyke Parks, An Invitation. I haven’t heard the latter, but anyway this is really enjoyable too, and really if I’d heard it when it came out last October, it probably would have been higher on my year-end list than The Bird And The Bee’s album, “Bottlecaps” is just heavenly. And the fact that I’ve just recently quadrupled the number of albums I’ve heard by Inara George and am still curious to hear more is a pretty good sign.

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