All Is Always Now (Live at the Stone)

Most of Fred Frith’s recordings have been collaborative: he’s worked with many bands and in duos or trios with many like-minded avant-garde musicians. This three-disc album documents live performances from between 2007 and 2016 at which he improvised alongside collaborators both illustrious (Laurie Anderson, Ikue Mori, Pauline Oliveros, Evan Parker) and more obscure. The music is all over the place: there’s some hellacious noise, there’s some gentle weirdness, there’s some pointillistic abstraction. All of it is worth hearing, and the album is a must for Frith’s fans.