desultory adj : marked by lack of definite plan or regularity or purpose; jumping from one thing to another; "desultory thoughts"; "the desultory conversation characteristic of cocktail parties"

English

Pronunciation

• italbrac RP /dɛˈsəltri/
• italbrac US /dɛˈsəltɔːri/

Adjective

1. Leaping or skipping about.
2. Jumping, or passing, from one thing or subject to another, without order or rational connection; without logical sequence; disconnected; immethodical; aimless.

   He wandered round, cleaning up in a desultory way.

   desultory minds

3. Out of course; by the way; as a digression; not connected with the subject.

   a desultory remark

   She made a desultory attempt at conversation.

4. disappointing in performance or progress.

Derived terms

• desultorily

References

Desultory was part of the first wave of Swedish death metal bands, alongside Entombed, Dismember, and others. Into Eternity, their Metal Blade debut following a lesser-known EP release, is standard for the genre, energetic and forceful, straddling the line between the more brutal American death style and the melodic Gothenburg variety.

Though not groundbreaking, it was considered a fine album by fans. By most accounts, their followup, Bitterness, is more of the same, but 1996's Swallow the Snake takes quite a different approach, dropping the death vocals (and, for the most part, death metal itself), for a more heavy rock sound likened by some to Soundgarden. Having been dropped by Metal Blade, they disappeared, but the three members from the Snake album recruited a new fourth member and, continuing the progression from that last album, continued on as the grunge rock act Zebulon, releasing at least one EP and one LP.

Line-up

• Klas Morberg - vocals/guitars
• Hakan Morberg - bass
• Thomas Johnson - drums

Former members

• Stefan Poge - lead guitar

Discography

• Forever Gone EP (1992)
• Into Eternity (1993)
• Bitterness (1994)
• Swallow the Snake (1996)

aberrant, aberrative, adrift, afloat, aimless, alternating, amorphous, broken, by the way, capricious, careening, casual, catchy, changeable, changeful, chaotic, choppy, circuitous, dancing, dangerous, departing, designless, deviable, deviant, deviating, deviative, deviatory, devious, digressive, disarticulated, disconnected, discontinuous, discursive, disjunct, disordered, disorderly, disorganized, dispersed, disproportionate, dizzy, eccentric, episodic, errant, erratic, excursive, fast and loose, fickle, fitful, flickering, flickery, flicky, flighty, flitting, fluctuating, fluttering, fluttery, formless, freakish, frivolous, giddy, gratuitous, guttering, halting, haphazard, hazardous, herky-jerky, heteroclite, hit-or-miss, immethodical, impetuous, impulsive, inchoate, incoherent, inconsistent, inconstant, indecisive, indirect, indiscriminate, infirm, insecure, insubstantial, intermittent, intermitting, irregular, irresolute, irresponsible, jerky, labyrinthine, loose, lurching, maundering, mazy, meandering, meaningless, mercurial, misshapen, moody, nonsymmetrical, nonsystematic, nonuniform, on-again-off-again, orderless, out-of-the-way, patchy, perilous, planetary, planless, precarious, promiscuous, provisional, purposeless, rambling, random, restless, risky, rough, roving, scatterbrained, scrappy, senseless, serpentine, shaky, shapeless, shifting, shifty, shuffling, slippery, snaky, snatchy, spasmatic, spasmic, spasmodic, spastic, spineless, spluttering, sporadic, spotty, sputtering, sputtery, staggering, straggling, straggly, stray, swerving, systemless, temporary, tentative, ticklish, treacherous, turning, twisting, unaccountable, unarranged, uncertain, unclassified, unconsidered, uncontrolled, undependable, undirected, undisciplined, unequal, uneven, unfaithworthy, unfixed, ungraded, unjoined, unmethodical, unmetrical, unordered, unorganized, unplanned, unpredictable, unregular, unreliable, unrestrained, unrhythmical, unsettled, unsolid, unsorted, unsound, unstable, unstable as water, unstaid, unsteadfast, unsteady, unsubstantial, unsure, unsymmetrical, unsystematic, untrustworthy, ununiform, vacillating, vagrant, vague, variable, veering, vicissitudinary, vicissitudinous, volatile, wandering, wanton, wavering, wavery, wavy, wayward, whimsical, winding, wishy-washy, wobbling, wobbly, zigzag