These Arms Are Snakes

These Arms Are Snakes, an artsy post-hardcore outfit from Seattle, blends punk’s raw urgency and confrontational vocals with the sprawling arrangements and intricate technique that defined the first generation of math-rock groups. That hybrid approach grew naturally out of the members’ earlier bands: vocalist Steve Snere had previously sung for Kill Sadie, the Minneapolis emo unit that later relocated to Seattle, while bassist-vocalist-keyboardist Brian Cook had played in the long-running math-rock outfit Botch. The same tight-knit circle also produced Minus the Bear, another Seattle post-hardcore band formed by Botch guitarist David Knudson and Kill Sadie bassist Cory Murchy; Erin Tate, who drummed for both Kill Sadie and an early incarnation of These Arms Are Snakes, later joined Minus the Bear as well, so a Pete Frame-style family tree of the scene would quickly become headache-inducing.

Snere, Cook, guitarist Ryan Frederiksen, keyboardist Jesse Robertson, and drummer Joe Preston issued the band’s debut EP, This Is Meant to Hurt You, on Jade Tree Records in August 2003. After Tate replaced Preston and Robertson departed, the remaining quartet delivered its first full-length album, Oxeneers or The Lion Sleeps When Its Antelope Go Home, in September 2004. Their second LP, Easter, arrived in fall 2006; new producer Chris Common, formerly of Roy and Harkonen, also assumed drumming duties from Ben Verellen. Over the following two years the group toured alongside Pelican, Mastodon, Hot Water Music, and the Blood Brothers, then returned with its third album, Tail Swallower and Dove, issued by Suicide Squeeze Records in October 2008.