You wouldn't normally associate the drummer Tom Rainey – and the kind of left-field New York-based improvisers with whom he forms natural collaborations – with the Great American Songbook. But for his third recording as leader, Obbligato, Rainey (known best for his influential work with Tim Berne and Craig Taborn) turns to the time-honoured art of standard interpretation. A late starter in terms of recording as a leader, Rainey has issued two previous CDs on the Swiss avant jazz label Intakt for a trio setup of sax-guitardrums. Here Rainey tries out another formation, the jazz quintet, a line up with more traditional links to standard playing. It enables the drummer and his longtime bassist partner Drew Gress to take up the role of the conventional pulse-anchored jazz rhythm section. However the instincts of Rainey and the members of his ensemble on this session still lean towards a looser collective improv instead of the more familiar head-solo form, as well towards a freer, pan-idiomatic approach towards harmony and texture. Yet the interpretations are not so evolved that the original tunes have become missing in action: the ex-London based German saxophonist Ingrid Laubrock, who appeared on both of Rainey's previous trio recordings, trumpeter Ralph Alessi and pianist Kris Davis fill tracks such as ‘Yesterdays’ with teasing quotes from the themes while on Ellington's ‘Prelude to a Kiss’ they take on an intoxicating free jazz collective ambience reminiscent of a Charles Mingus workshop. On Dave Brubeck's ‘In Your Own Sweet Way’ Laubrock unexpectedly reveals something of Warne Marsh's tone and phrasing as she weaves in and out of Kris Davis’ tippy-toe piano and the elegant, acidic trumpet tones of Alessi. There's a roaring free collective sprint via N'Orleans to the finishing line on a reprise of ‘Just in Time’. So who needs Radiohead? Obbligato shows that in the right hands the good old standard can still inspire freshly invigorating music.