Chicago band Detachment Kit’s sophomore effort Of This Blood is an odd, unpolished collection of jabbing, often nonsensically arranged guitars, and vocals that range from controlled, whiny whimpers to cacophonous, anger-ridden shouts. The dreamlike quality of the song “Music For Strobelights,” with its delightful harp-like beats, an interwoven heavy guitar and meditative singing, makes for euphonious listening. Though a bit mundane in execution, the last song, “Spider,” strips down the musical component to a lovely, pure acoustic guitar.

Contrarily, tunes like “Genivive the Countess” and “The Race” are random assortments of distorted noise that are neither innovative in style nor appealing in substance. “Vanish Or Vanquish” sounds like a defective Orgy tune stuck in a lackluster, redundant cycle. Scream-friendly “Ted the Electric” is an unsuccessful mixture of pretentious nü-metal with punk attitude.

The album offers a few melodic perks and savory insertions of extra instruments such as the cello and the accordion. Yet, every alluring melody is countered by a particularly irksome mixture of human sounds and monotonous beats, and after the first couple of songs, the rest of the album remains unchangingly humdrum.