Norwegian double-bassist Arild Andersen’s sound – a blend of nimble improv and long-note reverberations like a thunderous hum – has long enriched European jazz, but his work as a composer and bandleader (with a fledgling Jan Garbarek in the 70s, for starters) has been just as significant. On this absorbing live set the 70-year-old is joined by superb Jarrett/Mehldau-influenced pianist Helge Lien and drummer Gard Nilssen, an idiom-bridging original who often displays the whippy sound and thrill-building fireworks of Anton Eger with Phronesis. A sparing Tord Gustavsen-like piano melody glimmers through a veil of soft effects and arco purrs on the opening title track, but Lien’s surging solos and the spring of the leader’s fast improv off the crack of Nilssen’s imperious accents soon emphasise this set’s rhythmic power on the ruggedly rocking Science. Lien is lyrically fluid on the songlike pieces, pin-sharp and snappy on the staccato burnups – overall this is a subtly balanced set of folk-melody, ambient-bass tone-poems and vibrant American-rooted jazz.
