Ebba Åsman – No Answer

22nd March 2025 · 2020s, 2025, Jazz, Music

Ebba Åsman’s smoky late-night jazz is adorned with crackles of electronica on this brief taster from the Swedish trombonist’s new album.

Oh god it’s happened again. No sooner than I’ve listened to Miles Davis than I’ve been seduced by something else that sounds suspiciously like jazz – or at least jazz-adjacent.

Ebba Åsman is a Swedish composer and trombonist whose cross-fertilised music melds jazz with hip-hop and alternative R&B to create a smoky melancholic sound that’s all her own.

Recording in a wood cabin far from Stockholm in dead of winter, with temperatures plunging to -30 outside, Åsman logged from the outside world for a month, disconnecting TV, social media and emails to reconnect with the stillness and solitude of nature.

Like others before her – Justin Vernon/Bon Iver and Norwegian trumpeter Nils Petter Molvær spring immediately to mind – she infuses the organic sounds with crackles of electronica.

It’s all there in this brief but beautiful taster of her new album, produced and adorned with electronica by Berlin-based Lucy Liebe.