One of the most ambitious and musically accomplished combos to emerge from the Brooklyn underground in the late ‘00s, Skeletons are comprised of four Oberlin University alums with a penchant for West African rhythms, hectic Prince-derived R&B, and chaotic improvisational freak outs. Money is the group’s third widely available release and ably builds on the more organic, band-centric aesthetic of 2006’s Lucas. While Lucas boasted a thematic preoccupation with the wide-open spaces, all-night diners, and sprawling exurbs of Middle America, Money is firmly concerned with urban spaces. It opens with a few tentatively stricken chords on the piano accompanied by a symphony of street sounds and quickly plunges into the barely restrained chaos of “These Things,” a number that blends the unsteady lope of a wayward Mingus composition with the massed horns of Fela’s big band. The remainder of the record holds true to this pattern, with aggressive, tightly composed outbursts like “Booom! (Money)” offset by reflective snatches of ramshackle improvisation. The overall effect recalls nothing so much as the skewed eclecticism and idiosyncratic musical virtuosity of artists like Captain Beefheart and the post-modern big-band aesthetic of Charlie Haden’s Liberation Music Orchestra. This is demanding music, to be sure, but those willing to give it their time and attention will be handsomely rewarded.