Picking up the leftovers from At the Drive-In, Cedric Bixler and Omar Rodriguez formed the Mars Volta and have proved the best bands CAN start from doggie bags.

As you listen to a track from TMV, you’ll hear mystical psychedelic rock and free jazz forms, but if you listen close enough, you’ll find yourself on a progressive, crack-laden mission from God for a dimebag in a back alley that leaves you breathless and wanting more.

The group’s 2003 debut, “Deloused in the Comatorium,” reinvented artistic rock. It’s a genius of an album and you must buy it. Go.

For 2005’s “Frances the Mute,” Omar and Cedric brought in strings, horns, electronic programming, hookahs, Flea, John Frusciante and more (I’m guessing geisha girls and shroom posters, but who really knows?).

This is an album that’s meant to be played as an album. Don’t jump around in the tracks – trust me. There are no song breaks and the track listing reads more like an Opera program than Track #1: Song Name; Track #2: Song Name. If you’re up for the trip, following along with the lyrics.

Oh, and I hope you’re bilingual. “L’ Via L’ Viaquez” is sung half in Spanish, half in English, which I find refreshing, especially amidst mind-blowing time and key signature changes that will ensure you can’t listen to this album in your cubicle at work.

But you don’t need to know what the lyrics mean, either literally and metaphorically. Bixler’s vocals juxtapose claustrophobic physical ticks with naked truth, and as Bill Murray said in Meatballs, “It just doesn’t matter.”

“Frances,” whether a mute or not, has miraculously risen from the “Comatorium” for a repeat appearance. I can’t wait for the concert.

The Mars Volta’s “Frances the Mute” is in stores now from Universal Records.