HEDVIG MOLLESTAD
DOM LAWSON
Ekhidna RUNE GRAMMOFON
Jazz rock nirvana from Norway’s six-string queen.
Fans of berserk psychedelic rock will already be familiar with Hedvig Mollestad thanks to the six albums the Norwegian guitarist has released with her eponymous Trio over the last decade.
Mollestad was formally schooled in jazz, at the Norwegian Academy of Music, but although her music has routinely embraced improvisation and amorphous structures, Ekhidna is the first record she has released under her own name that truly belongs in the jazz realm. A collaboration with latter-day drumming legend Torstein Lofthus, keyboard players Marte Eberson and Erlend Slettevoll, trumpeter Susana Santos Silva and percussionist Ole Mofjell, these songs exhibit the same untameable energy that Mollestad has made a trademark, but in an entirely fresh and invigorating context.