Supple improvisations weave a hypnotic spell on Beginningless from Anna Butterss' new trio

First there was Flea’s surprising (and richly satisfying) departure from the funk-rock day job on Honora, then Jeff Parker’s predictably stellar ETA IVtet workout Happy Today and, most recently, SML’s brilliantly spacious Spontaneous Live Music. Recorded with Indiana-rooted drummer Ben Lumsdaine and trumpeter John Raymond, Beginningless maintains their strong winning streak. Butterss, Raymond, and Lumsdaine may not have recorded together before in this exact combination, but the roots of their collaboration goes back more than a decade. In some ways, the trio shares a fair chunk of their MO with Butterss’ work in SML and with Parker’s ETA IVtet. The music heard on Beginningless is likewise totally improvised, with minimal overdubbing or post-production tweaking allowed – even the shape- and sound-bending effects via pedals and processing that make their presence felt over the course of the album were applied at the source. In this case, however, the trio cooked up their improvisations in an LA studio rather than live on stage. In lesser hands, such a risky set-up could easily crumble into competitively busy noodling, with each musician trying to claim as much of the available room ...