Swiss trio VEIN are masters of musical interplay. Over the course of the last decade they've developed fruitful collaborations with altoist Greg Osby and with Dave Liebman, who featured on their 2014 album Jazz Talks. But they're at their most playful when it's just the trio. This new release, inspired by their collective love for chamber music, is varied and engrossing. VEIN trademarks – flighty melodies shipwrecked by lurching, stop start grooves and games of rhythmic cat and mouse – vie with washes of inky, impressionistic harmony and pulsing ambience. The abstract opening to ‘Prelude’ recalls a serialist tone row, but it winds up as a softly-spoken swinger. ‘In Medias Res’ and ‘Ballet Of The Monkeys’ are helter-skelter sonic collages. ‘Ode To The Sentimental Knowledge’ is a liquescent ballad. On ‘Pastorale’ Thomas Lähns' bowed bass takes the lead and recalls the reedy tone of a Chinese Erhu fiddle, while ‘Sheherazade’ is a feature for Florian Arbenz on Hadgini Udu, a Nigerian tonal drum made of clay. And what can I say about the shimmering, minimalist ‘Poème De Nuit’? It's just stunning. This may well count among my albums of the year.