One of Sweden’s leading contemporary jazz acoustic bassists Lars Danielsson lines up here alongside the excellent Stefano Bollani trio Danish drummer Morten Lund and the Norwegian saxophonist Marius Neset, a startlingly gifted rising star who’s been imaginatively aligning a muscular post-fusion school of playing sax with contemporary approaches to European ‘third stream’. The spontaneous nature of the recording – mostly one takes involving zero preparation and rehearsals – is an unusual context for this trio of contemporary Scandinavian jazz musicians who made a plan to meet again with their instruments having bumped into each other on a train coming back from the Jazz Baltica festival in Northern Germany. Anyone who’s heard Neset’s work so far – with its blurring of the processes of composition and improvisation – might still have the impression he’s made for this kind of ‘blowing’ encounter. Indeed, his bustling, sinewy energy is all over the recording. The lion’s share of the tunes, however, are written by Danielsson with single contributions from Lund and Neset and one cover, Don Grolnich’s ballad ‘The Cost of Living’ on which Neset hints at the impact made on him by Michael Brecker (someone who Danielsson accompanied briefly in the 1980s), the best known version of the tune appearing on Brecker’s eponymous 1987 debut album. Those who’ve been following Danielsson’s prolific catalogue on ACT since his 2004 debut Libera Me might be more used to his woody, song-like Jaco-ish acoustic bass resonating in a mellower, easy-on- the-ears recital room-like context. They might be pleasantly surprised at the upbeat, freely energising spirit of this session.