Devin and his cohort met at UCLA’s Herbie Hancock Institute of Jazz Performance, and Mr Hands himself has personally mentored the young alto prodigy and taken him on tour. The title track of this, his second album, shows us why: Daniels simply explodes out of the gate with a flurry of creative phrases before the theme, a sort of Ornette-ish gospel chant, kicks in – then he’s away, his poky, acidic tone burning over a tricky dotted rhythm bassline. In a similar vein to the Immanuel Wilkins quartet, Daniels and his band operate at the forefront of the US acoustic jazz tradition - there are versions of Monk’s ‘Ugly Beauty’ and the evergreen ‘Scrapple From The Apple’, and the soloists’ language is rooted in bop and it’s more free-ranging successors, but the rhythm arrangements are furiously contemporary so that Coltrane’s ‘Spiral’ seesaws between straight swing and a breakneck Vijay Iyer inspired 11/8.

If that sounds intense, it definitely is. Tunes like ‘Reckon’ show a more contemplative side and indicate Daniels' potential as a composer, and while there’s still a flavour of the conservatoire about some of the studiedly knotty themes, the overt link with the powerful, edgy West Coast black avant-garde tradition of Horace Tapscott and Arthur Blythe imbues this music with palpable passion and commitment. Outstanding.