(Locust)

New York's No-Neck Blues Band (NNCK henceforth) sound nothing like Robert Johnson, pay no homage to Muddy Waters, and don't cover any Willie Dixon tunes. Rather, NNCK roam the improv-without-a-net margins with daring inscrutability. The follow-up to their most "accessible" release, 2005's Qvaris, Clomeim finds NNCK manifesting a synapse-frazzled space-jazz/folkadelic whatsis that makes the Sun Ra Arkestra seem conservative. Unsettlingly feral in parts and intriguingly baffling in others, Clomeim excavates ecstasy from anguish and finds otherworldly beauty in formlessness. It's arcane, ritualistic music for a cult as yet undocumented on Wikipedia. recommended