Aging punks, take note: Those veterans of post-hardcore reference point Bitch Magnet, guitarist Jon Fine and drummer Orestes Morfin, have recruited bassist Simon Kobayashi (Smallgang) to form the all-instrumental We Contain Multitudes. The curious band name, a wink to the Walt Whitman poem “Song Of Myself,” reveals all.

Whitman’s unconventional ode to multiplicity and inclusivity rejects the constraints of form and theme. His elusive Self embraces, engulfs, expands. With debut LP Minako (Japanese for “beautiful child”), We Contain Multitudes honors Whitman’s fraternal, free-verse legacy:

Through the swirling psychedelia and controlled chaos of the title track opener, building and inflating and sprawling into an oration, a collaborative illustration that no man may be an island but nor is he a barren field;

Through the crunchy metal that thrusts “Can We Just Not” toward a warm reminiscence of Rodan, that other beautiful child, equally majestic, mellow’d by the wisdom that comes with age;

Through the Tortoise-shell prism of ’70s prog and ’90s indie on “D9,” propell’d by a waterfall bass tossing us with glee into a thirst-quenching plunge basin;

By virtue of the adrenaline rush of frantic-yet-meticulous drumming downshift’d to a gentle stroll, a reassuring acceptance that “We Are All Fucked”;

By virtue of the Fucking Champs testosterone jolt on “Bathroom Drugs,” its math-rock precision, its soaring six-string birdcalls and, yes, even its playful handclaps;

Where “Jeitinho” revisits the Peanuts theme as Brazilian jazz;

Where album closer “Atkins” opens crunchy and plodding, later unfurl’d into an outpouring of instrumentation, only to dissolve into frilly wisps of melody and swaying camaraderie.

Near the close of his masterpiece, Whitman assures us that his ever-shifting Self does “contain multitudes.” WCM transcribes this boast to the plural “we”—ambiguously assigning it either to the trio or to all of humankind. Indeed, the group’s sound is without boundaries: Self-realization is a test of endurance when all the beautiful children of the multitudes within us require their own individual expression.

Wisely foregoing lyrics, which would only clutter or dilute the splendor of the ineffable, the album leaves much unspoken: meaning, intent, destination, ….

The album speaks to the listener, without having uttered a single word, of shared destinies, of common ground, of universal experiences, of ….

The album’s conception, its execution, the otherworldliness it imparts to the listener are all a heart-swelling testament to the trio’s …

—Eric Bensel