Listening to They Shoot Horses, Don’t They feels a little like that day your parents left you alone at the carnival during an apocalyptic parade of clowns. There’s a vaguely happy-sounding tuba bouncing in the distance, but you can’t help feeling a little anxious.

If the name of the eight-piece Vancouver art rock band sounds familiar, it’s because the group’s moniker shares the title of a book, a Sydney Pollack movie, and an Apostle of Hustle song.

But lead singer Josh “Nut Brown” Neelands doesn’t like talking about names much. (I had to search around to find his real name, and he’s vowed to never again speak of the band name in interviews.) Instead, he and his band would prefer to redefine the word weird.

Known for frenetic, arty, and, well, “weird” live shows, They Shoot Horses, Don’t They features a distinctive horn section that has drawn comparisons to gypsy, circus, and carnival music. That said, it’s a lot faster, a lot more abstract and a lot more art rocky.

The result is something strangely fierce, dissonant and vaguely uplifting. After all, a band with a prominent horn section can only sound so menacing. It might best be described as disorientingly exhilarating, like those days you wake up after a dream that wasn’t quite a nightmare, but close enough to make you think about all that stuff that resides somewhere in your head.

Nut Brown, who earned his nickname from a killer tan, is hesitant to categorize his music as circus, carnival or anything else. He said he’d like listeners to have active imaginations when they listen, and feels these definitions can limit what people hear in music.

“I hope everybody walks away with something completely different,” he says, over a gigantic piece of chocolate cake. “One guy sees faces melting and eyeballs falling out of sockets, and another sees neon flowers blooming. Good music is different for different people.”

However, Nut Brown is also able to offer an explanation for why the comparisons to gypsy and circus music keep coming up.

“I like chromatic scales,” Nut Brown says. “Sometimes they are used in those music forms. There is also a certain energy that runs through those types of music that could be likened to the way we play our songs. We get into it; There’s none of that detached nonchalant coolness you may find in the rock-and-roll world.”

Nut Brown is one of only two founding members left in the band, which began four years ago while he was in media studies at Emily Carr. Now two full albums in, he hopes it’s going to be a long-term project.

“This is music I could get old doing,” he says. “In 20 years I feel like I’ll probably be sitting down and doing it, with a croaky old voice, yelling and screaming. It could get grouchy. It might slow down a bit, but we’ll always try and be as fast as possible.”

The band’s second album on Kill Rock Stars, Pick Up Sticks, is scheduled for release on June 5th. Nut Brown says to expect a similar sound to 2006’s Boo Hoo Hoo Boo, but with more polish, focus, and attention to song structure.

“There’s also a couple of sexy-time songs on the album,” Nut Brown says. “But it’s not like hot-sexy, but more kind of scary-sexy.”

He elaborates: “They Shoot Horses is a savage, desperate place where there is very little time for sweet nothings,” he says. “I did manage to squeeze in the lyric ‘Love is the best thing in the world’ on the last album, but of course, that is coming from a sad and lonely place. It’s probably not exactly romantic love.”

They Shoot Horses, Don’t They play May 18th at the Lamplighter for their CD release party with The Doers and Hank and Lily. They also play an all ages show on May 19th at Hoko Karaoke Bar.