There’s a lot to be said for off-the-handle madness siphoned into four minutes at a time – witness TLOBF’s ongoing love of Islet. Even so, Swahili Blonde are difficult to get a consistent handle on. Chiefly the project of LA’s Nicole Turley, Man Meat features credits for members of Warpaint and The Like, ex-Red Hot Chili Pepper John Frusciante (who, in fairness considering that career note, has often made a point of exploring the outer reaches in his solo albums and side projects) and Duran Duran bassist John Taylor (who hasn’t). These seven tracks of spread out percussive jams, guitar skronk, rhythmic hits and tempos that follow their own agenda throw impractical rhythms into tight spaces and try to make something danceable out of them.

Basing songs around cryptic shout-outs and jittery backings styled around the Slits, were their dub reggae teachings replaced by a schooling around New York’s original No Wave scene, Swahili Blonde almost make a point of never settling into a holding pattern. That’s not always to their benefit. Take ‘Elixor Fixor’, driven by rickety drum machine quite possibly from Casio pre-set judging by the sound and the way it speeds up and slows down. Based on tribal wordless vocal swoops, it’s never allowed to settle into the becalmed pattern it occasionally suggests, but it doesn’t work as approachable freeform either. On a wider tack ‘Red Money’ tries to be Propaganda but does too well at sounding dated to the mid-80s, and not in the revivalist way. Throughout the album drums surge, violin shrieks John Cale-like and synths burble underneath, but it rarely feels like it’s heading towards a set point.

There is one moment where Turley and co properly succeed in finding a happy medium. Starring disco bass, wiry, twisty guitar, horns and chants,’La Mampatee’ is where the ambitions towards hitting upon a deformed funk groove properly coalesce. It’s a scratchy reversioning of post-punk as it was first time around that’d slot in perfectly between Pigbag and Delta 5. They try to catch that lightning in a bottle again, but are let down by either not finding a strong enough melody to hook the rhythm and Frusciante’s sinuous Chic Organisation guitar licks onto or getting bogged down, as on ‘Tiny Shaman’. The stumbling block is their fascination with mantras and abstraction over ultimately deciding whether to head further out or lock down, ending up carrying on long after the inspiration has run out. Man Meat makes strides towards finding the killer avant-groove, but a decent editor might have come in handy.