Coalesce

Coalesce might go down in local music history as the band that refused to die. But even though the on-again-off-again quartet has broken up more times than a cell phone call from Jupiter, fans of thoughtful hardcore don’t mind waiting out the downtimes. Coalesce’s lethal combination of assault-and-battery guitar clatter and Sean Ingram’s sandpaper roar belie the intelligence that’s always been buried in the mix. Even those who can’t decipher a word of Ingram’s meaty prose know he’s saying something important. After reuniting for a spring tour, many pundits assumed the band would return home and split faster than John Popper’s pants in a toe-touching contest. But Coalesce is a cat with at least nine lives, and its legion of devotees should be on hand to purr at the group’s latest return to the stage.