Originally released in 1977 on Institute of Percussive Studies, the label founded by Graves and fellow free-jazz drummer Andrew Cyrille, Bäbi has long been a rare and sought-after treasure among serious collectors. Moreover, with Graves’ visibility higher than ever following last year’s critically lauded art-house biopic Milford Graves Full Mantis, it’s a highly opportune time for this to resurface. Yet, at the same time, there’s an elemental energy at the heart of this session that imparts glimpses of the eternal, as though it never actually went away. At first glance, it’s a simple set up: Graves, an implacable presence, is grounded front and centre, thumping his earthy, snare-less, low-toned kit with studious abandon and irrupting into wild vocals – from Yosemite Sam scat outbursts to Yoruba yodel and rapid-fire counting that reveals a rigorous polyrhythmic underpinning – while Doyle and Glover, stationed to either side, offer a supporting role, firing pained howls and stinging shrieks into the atmosphere. The result is a deep, ritualistic, audio magic. A second CD featuring a home recording of the same trio made seven years earlier in 1969, and lost in Graves’ archives until 2017, is a much less well recorded session. Graves’ deep toms sound sunk in watery mud and the saxes strain at the limits of fidelity, pulsing in waves as though too huge and powerful for the mic to capture. But what it lacks in clarity it makes up for in pure, overwhelming, ecstatic charge.