There isn’t much saxophonist Ed Jones hasn’t done in terms of the broader spectrum of jazz, from acid jazz with US3 and Incognito to hard bop, electronica through to free improv, with a key mentor in the latter being cult drummer John Stevens. And that’s the one area that has the most bearing on his new duo recording with the drummer Emil Karlsen documented weekly under last year’s lockdown conditions at Leeds Conservatoire where the young Norwegian was a post-graduate and where Jones teaches. Improvisations shift around themes: Jones’ sleepily chromatic ruminations build to a fiery post-Trane offensive in ‘October’; Jones selects further from his discerning palette of extended effects from whispered harmonics to growling intensity in the improvs during ‘November’ while his snaky, hypnotic looping phrases sends him into more Evan Parker-like territory at times in the ‘December’ sessions.

It feels more 'solo sax with drums accompaniment' for the most part but Karlsen’s undemonstrative role and trance-y ambient percussive style keeps things firmly grounded throughout the recording.