‘Cloudward’ offers a rare chance to see how Mary Halvorson’s music evolves when everything else is kept the same.

‘Thollem’s Astral Traveling Sessions with John Dieterich’ tingles your auditory senses because this is breaking new ground and they’re defining the whole dobro/synth genre as they go along. There might not be two musicians better equipped to be the first at doing that.

Get good music, help a cause and celebrate the union of two powerful improvising forces, Deerhoof and Wadada Leo Smith. May there be many more such unions.

It gets harder to be artful in an original way in these days, but Logan Hone and his quirky quartet does it and does it well.

Even when reflecting on the 80s of their youth Deerhoof tends to favor making rock music the makeshift way most rock music was made in the 60s, and the method matters for this music.

Scott Amendola was right, his opus orchestra piece just couldn’t be a special, one-night-only performance. Fortunately, it won’t be now.

Markus James, Deerhoof, Dave Liebman, Don Pullen and Arild Anderson are included in S. Victor Aaron’s Top Unreviewed Records of 2014.

They find plenty of common ground in this improvisational, experimental space.