Ohio-based guitarist, Ed Ricart, has already played with an impressive cross-section of America's contemporary creative music community, from William Hooker to members of Tortoise. Those two examples provide a pretty good clue to the feel of his quartet's debut, which sits somewhere between free-jazz and improvised out-rock. At one extreme, tracks like ‘Eurypterids’ dabble in nervous, fidgety improv and abstract noise – with guitar effects providing whooshing sci-fi soundscapes – building to a muscular free-crunch thanks, largely, to Andrew Barker's powerfully insistent drums. At the other end of the spectrum, tunes like the opening number ‘Celestial Mechanics’ – hung on a deep, fluid, spontaneously generated rhythm-section groove – allow the band to dig into bullish, Scorch Trio-esque free-fusion, topped off with stinging lead guitar and Herb Robertson's high, alien trumpet trill. It's as compact and maneuverable as an all-terrain moon-buggy, and a really convincing blast-off from a rising young guitar star.