After 20 years spent on the stand with artists as diverse as Sia and Gary Bartz, pianist Barney McAll recently returned home to Melbourne. This album is the result of his reacquaintance with the city and its luminaries, featuring the rhythm section of Hiatus Kaiyote, guitarist Laneous and vocalists Rita Satch and Jace XL.

This is the sound of a band vibing out, but man shall not live on vibes alone, and the album gets stuck in that single, slow speed. A smattering of Hiatus Kaiyote’s wide-eyed ‘wondercore’ might have livened up proceedings, but glimpses of that energy are fleeting. The problems begin at the start. The title track that opens is a homage to Leon Thomas and Pharoah Sanders, but that pales in comparison; where the original Bartz quintet version is light and genuinely precious, here the arrangement is sluggish and heavy, failing to really move anywhere despite Julien Wilson’s emotive soloing. (For how good it could sound pared down, check out house music DJ Mike Gurrieri’s remix online).

Elsewhere, McAll awkwardly grafts Coltrane changes onto Doris Akers’ ‘Sweet Sweet Spirit’. Bartz commented that he wants to make a whole album of hymns treated similarly; I certainly won’t be queuing up to hear it. Other tributes – ‘Stevland’ and ‘John Coltrane’ – are funkier and more mysterious, but lean on the slow. Precious Energy is certainly full of sunny warmth, but too much of it leaves you feeling soporific.