An additional record to add to the marlbank list of best jazz albums of 2021 on the next and final update in a few months. (Latest list, the two-thirds-through compiled recently snapshot is here). It's obvious why. Well beyond sheer instrumentalism which there is wherever you listen, a group sense (ditto) there's also wit. Seven years since the release of Riverside, the wonderful Chet Doxas-Dave Douglas record that got the essence of Jimmy Giuffre to the very marrow, retro fiend Doxas' Mark Twain tribute 'Twelve foot blues' has an airy, dancing, quality to its feel. An all-star setting that finds the tenorist with pianist Ethan Iverson and double bassist Thomas Morgan it's interesting hearing Iverson playing against Doxas who is a very different player stylistically to the Warne Marsh-ian Mark Turner heard memorably on Temporary Kings. ‘Lodestar (for Lester Young)’ is another highlight of the drummer-less record. It's unusual to hear a jazz album that works without a drummer (and coincidentally there was no drummer on the even more depopulated Temporary Kings). Iverson goes ''classical'' at the beginning of 'The Last Pier'. Listen how the section then changes to jazz as Doxas who can play very softly coaxes the trio along in laidback fashion. Morgan acts as the secret weapon of mass instruction throughout. Out now