♫♪  Many Arms - “Greater Mass”

“Greater Mass,” the heavy-fisted debut song off Many Arms’ new album Suspended Definition (a little jazz pun for you there), is built on a violent dialogue between electric guitar and saxophone, two instruments that equally revolutionized the eras in which they were introduced. And BAM: a long-awaited battle of intellect and brute strength begins. Years of tension is released in the span of nine and a half minutes, which is relatively short considering the number of times the band readdresses the idea of a “chorus,” before rejecting it with explosive intensity. Seriously, try to find Waldo. Not all of Many Arms’ songs are so athletic — in truth, its hard to imagine the band sitting still for longer than eight seconds — this one here is a bastard child, though. The band retains structure by moving as one unit, tackling intense improvisation with equally matched intensity but never straying far from one another, moving in a million different direction but powering forward as an aggregate.

In one corner, Nick Millevoi’s dissonant trichords and veiny, muscle-bound threads of notes superimpose guest musician Colin Fisher’s tantrum outbursts of squalling noise. Each attack is anchored with dizzying dexterity by bassist John DeBlase and drummer Ricardo Lagomasino, who both manage to expel tight grooves in between bursts of bloodthirsty free jazz and maintain peak Lance Armstrong-levels of inertia. With a Burroughs-style approach to not giving a fuck, Many Arms combine basement punk and 50s avant-garde to terrifying effect. Listen to them with your family and THIS THIS will most likely happen.

• Many Arms: http://www.manyarmsband.com
• Tzadik: http://www.tzadik.com

Chocolate Grinder

CHOCOLATE GRINDER is our audio/visual section, with an emphasis on the lesser heard and lesser known. We aim to dig deep, but we’ll post any song or video we find interesting, big or small.

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