Jazzman stands tall among ‘serious crate diggers’, and this series is one of the label's crowning glories. Like all sub-genres, ‘spiritual or deep jazz’ can easily turn to cliché if artists skim the surface of the vocabulary rather than seizing the bedrock, but the compilations are so discerningly curated there is no danger of that. Now Volume 8 of the ‘modal, esoteric and ethereal’ has Japan as the host country, so to speak, and the material, shining a spotlight on artists little recognised in Europe, is staggering. Music from the likes of Mitsuaki Kanno, Minoru Muraoka and the more well known Sadao Watanabe (here with fellow alto-saxophonist Charlie Mariano) are fine examples of how fruitful a path was opened up by the pioneering footsteps of David Amram, Yusef Lateef and the Coltranes. The Japanese artists lend a bewitchingly noble character to hypnotic scalar structures where the sense of infinity is well served by a sound palette given particularly rich hues by the presence of several beautiful non-western instruments. Think shakuhachi, koto, biwa, tsuzumi and wadaiko. The resonance of bamboo casing and silk strings creates a rapture that is irresistible.