The first song that really stood out for me from incantatory BTW Extra Life was Secular Works‘s “Blackmail Blues,” best described as a darker, heavier Dirty Projectors backed by Torch Of The Mystics Sun City Girls. But that’s just one look. This past fall I booked a show that included PERIOD, the weirdo metallic jazz band that includes Extra Life singer/guitarist/songwriter Charlie Looker, who you might also recognize from ZS, Mick Barr formations, and DP’s Rise Above (in 2008 Extra Life did a split 12″ with Nat Baldwin). He’s also worked with Glenn Branca, Daniel Carter, Anthony and Tyondai Braxton, and you’ll find a number of these tendencies and aesthetics on Extra Life’s sophomore album Made Flesh, but I keep coming back to PERIOD’s heavy, bleak electro-jazz drifts while listening to “The Ladder” and its clamoring backdrop. For Made Flesh, Looker surrounded himself with violinist Caley Monahon-Ward, bassist Anthony Gedrich (STATS, Ocrilim), drummer Nicholas Podgurski, and saxophonist/keyboardist Travis Laplante. The collection was recorded by metal multi-tasker Marston (Krallice, Gorguts, Behold the Arctopus, Dysrhythmia) with Monahon-Ward. See what all of this sounds like.

• Extra Life – “The Ladder (Radio Edit)”Download

For old time’s sake, Extra Life’s heartbreaker:

• Extra Life – “Black Hoodie (Pre-Album Version)”Download

“Black Hoodie” shows up on Made Flesh in slightly different form.

Made Flesh is out 3/30 on Loaf, where you can stream the entire collection. The single “Head Shrinker” will arrive with a Peaking Team-directed video and Tyondai Braxton remix on Socket Records. To get the word out, there’ll also be an R. Kelly cover split 7″ with Larkin Grimm for Planaria, a split 7-inch with Parenthetical Girls where each band will cover the other, and a remix by JG “Foetus” Thirlwell. The album looks like this: