Monford’s 2012 debut was titled Perseverence – and fittingly so. Armed with a three-point remit - intention, application, community - the Detroit-based alto saxophonist, bandleader, educator and experimentalist has forged a distinctive path that powers through the intersection of varied pursuits.

Recorded over five extended performances at the established Cliff Bell’s Club in Detroit with a multi-generational ensemble of players including Arkestra bassist Jaribu Shahid, The Tribe keyboardist Pamela Sahila Wise and rising star MC Napi Devi, this long-awaited sophomore album weaves such creative strands into a cohesive, often magical whole.

There’s hard-bop here, and soul-jazz and jazz violin and some scorching Afro-Latin wig-outs, not least on opener and lead single ‘Jah-Jah’, a multifaceted journey lifted by the crowd’s audible goodwill and traversing thumping Gnawa-style basslines, Afro-Cuban montunos and the alto’s impassioned golden flow. Montford rubbed elbows early on with neighbours and pending beats greats J Dilla and Amp Fiddler, and his immersion in Motor City hip-hop inform this self-described musical autobiography as much as free jazz, spiritual jazz and the boundary-leaping that fellow Detroiter Yusef Lateef called ‘Autophysiopsychic’ (that is, music from one’s physical, mental and spiritual self).

With tracks like ‘Piercing Eyes’, an ode to his mother, melding these diverse influences in ways clever, seamless and often whoah-inducing, The Cloth I’m Cut From is both technicolour dreamcoat and a testament to keeping on, and keeping it real.