Californian guitarist Henry Kaiser's previous collaborators include such legends of rock and free jazz as Fred Frith, Richard Thompson, John French, Derek Bailey, John Oswald and Jim O'Rourke. For this latest improvisational adventure he has teamed up with UK guitarist Ray Russell whose 1970s albums June 11, 1971 – Live At The ICA, Rites & Rituals and Secret Asylum were overlooked at the time, but have since been recognised as classics of the genre. It is the spirit that forged those records that prompted Kaiser to nudge Russell back into the recording studio in the hope that another improvisational album could be birthed. The Celestial Squid is the raucous result, a crazed merging of free jazz explosion, science fiction soundtrack exploration and unholy row – through which occasionally shines some quite incredible sounding guitar playing from both contributors. Russell is in particularly fine form, harking back to the McLaughlin-esque shapes he was making in 1971 on Rites & Rituals. Kaiser is equally inventive as he lets loose from his guitar electrified psychedelic mantras coupled with Derek Bailey styled meditations that merge with Russell's more jazz oriented bluster and roar. The various musical tropes from Kaiser's previous collaborations (Captain Beefheart, electric period Miles Davis et al) nostalgically waft through the session like sonic incense, but on the whole this sounds like a lot of fun was had by all involved – and hearing Ray Russell play like a demon again is certainly worth the price of admission alone.