Near the middle of “Trembletongue,” we actually get to hear what Captain Beefheart’s squid eating dough in a polyethylene bag sounds like. It’s a desperate, repeating thump over a leering funhouse organ while our city’s own Slim Twig moans, frantically recounting a tale of horror (“breathless and helpless, my rapture did end all this”). When he’s singing, you can hear him twitch; when he’s not, you can imagine what’s making him. You can draw a crooked line from Beefheart through no wave to these tangles of arachnoid guitar and serpentine vocals, but on only his second EP (last year’s drum-machine-driven Whiite Fantaseee was recorded after this full-band disc, but released first) Twig’s already cultivated an original persona: he quivers erratically on “Birthing and Birthing” and redefines the gentlemanly stereotype with filthy come-ons on “Austere Gentleman.” Your mileage will vary, but followers of the gnarled quicksilver sound that leaks into the atmosphere every decade or so will want to shake this man’s bony hand.

Email us at: LETTERS@EYEWEEKLY.COM or send your questions to EYEWEEKLY.COM
625 Church St, 6th Floor, Toronto M4Y 2G1