The Borametz Tree

There's a lot to enjoy under The Borametz Tree, a musical interzone from Cambridge guitarist C Joynes, encompassing desert blues and North and West African music with English folk and angular, atonal modernism. Joining Joynes are the avant-folk trio Dead Rat Orchestra. There are sharp contrasts from song to song – ‘Sang Kancil’ has what sound like Chinese melodies, while ‘The Vegetable Lamb of Tartary’ is medieval French troubadour music, and ‘Hamasien Wedding Song’ decamps to peeling desert guitar territory, only with martial bass drum and whistles to accompany it. It's a musical hybrid and fantastical beast that pushes the envelope of experimentation and style, and sounds unlike any other release.

Its title is drawn from the mythical travellers' tales of the ancient world – in this case, a ‘sheep tree’ (name-checked on ‘The Vegetable Lamb of Tartary’ and on the cover) with links to Herodotus and ancient Jewish folklore. The music itself is a zoophyte hybrid of forms and species, often dizzyingly eclectic and, on the pounding, rhythmic ‘Librarie du Maghreb’, sprouting its wings into an otherworld of hypnotic trance.