Saxophonist Peter Brötzmann has long enjoyed the possibilities afforded by configurations that sit well outside the boundaries of conventional jazz groups, previously playing with artists as diverse as Moroccan gnawa master Maalem Mokhta Gania and Japanese koto player Michiyo Yagi. This date continues that tradition, bringing together two long-time collaborators – pedal steel guitarist Heather Leigh and cellist Fred Lonberg-Holm – to form one of his more unusual trios. Leigh doesn't stray far from her customary bag of licks, conjuring gauzy clouds, woozily wobbling tremolo and doom-laden dive-bombs, while Lonberg-Holm lays a sombre foundation of deep, electronically augmented arco and rough scrapes. Within this meter-free ambience, Brötzmann is free to wander, daubing plaintive calls, compact bluesy phrases and more gnarled clusters. It's a lonely sound, the horn somehow lost and peering through a lugubrious murk.

The set was performed as part of Brötzmann's 80th birthday celebration, which marked a return to the stage after the enforced Covid-19 hiatus and was, by all accounts, a joyous affair. Yet, the music is decidedly elegiac – mournful, even – as though Brötzmann is taking time to reflect on a long life lived fully and without compromise, and the many sacrifices incurred.