If the one-touch hipness of the mid-60s Miles Davis band and the methods of a free-improv conceptual revolutionary like saxophonist Evan Parker had ever fused, the result might have sounded a bit like The Earthworm’s Eye View – the debut of a new project by Roller Trio and Django Django saxophonist James Mainwaring, with Michael Bardon and Joost Hendrickx on bass and drums, and their formidable Leeds College mentor Matthew Bourne on Fender Rhodes. They take jazz, improv, contemporary-classical and world music in their stride, and Bourne’s experience and imagination let him prod and shadow them everywhere. Sax phrases like drum hits draw on hip-hop, while there are keyboard collages recalling Bitches Brew, and sax outbursts as ferocious as Parker’s or Peter Brotzmann’s. Playful, dark, skilful and spontaneous, it’s not just a free-jazz fan’s set, but a surefooted trip across many persuasions in contemporary music.
