REGULAR readers of this column will be aware that from time to time I am asked to review new releases from groups and individuals who are launching a career in jazz and looking for publicity, any kind as long as it isn’t totally negative, to give them a helping hand on to the ladder.

I always make a point of listening to the albums, and making what I consider to be a fair and balanced assessment.

However, I have to confess that having listened to the launch CD of the “hot” new jazz group Roller Trio, I am struggling to comment with any significant objectivity.

Anyone who knows me will confirm that I am a bebop and mainstream addict, big band and small group.

I freely admit that I stopped listening after Cool And Crazy by Shorty Rogers and The Giants. Okay, that’s an exaggeration, but I am not the most tolerant listener when it comes to avant garde jazz or freeform, if you will.

That is not to say that I don’t recognise ability and talent when I hear it. I most certainly do. It is simply that, having wallowed in swing music for the past 60-plus years, I am not the best person to sit in judgement on musicians who are pushing back the frontiers and setting new parameters.

Roller Trio are James Mainwairing (tenor sax and electronics), Luke Wynter (guitar) and Luke Reddin-Williams (drums).

They met while studying at the excellent Leeds College of Music and have astonishing individual ability. Their CD, simply entitled Roller, is a compilation of their own compositions, and a bravura attempt to introduce their particular type of instrumentation into the genre with some imaginative, fresh and experimental sounds.

It is factually accurate to say at this point that some of the UK’s most respected jazz critics have greeted this CD and the band’s live performances with rapturous reviews, particularly one by bbc.co.uk which followed their debut at the 2012 Manchester Jazz festival.

The album is released on the F-IRE Presents label, and the band can be located on rollertrio.com twitter.com/rollertrio and facebook.com/rollertrio.

I urge you to give them a listen.

The 2013 series of jazz concerts in the Brunel Suite of Horwich RMI is launched tomorrow when the first group of the 10 who will appear in rotation during the coming months takes to the stage.

In view of their continuing popularity, it was an automatic choice to begin the new series with The Mark Lewis Trio, with special guests Wilf Nuttall (vibes) and Lyn Fairbanks (vocals).

This is the third year in which jazz has been staged in the Brunel, and the standard of the groups has been consistently high. However, in the popularity stakes, there is no question that the MLT with Wilf and Lyn has always attracted the biggest audiences, numerically that is. Tomorrow will be no exception, so be early is the advice.

Next Friday sees the return of yet another very popular combo in George Galway and Friends.

Irishman George, who has a wonderful line in self-deprecating humour, is a terrific sax and flute player. He will be accompanied by Michael Burns (trumpet and flugel), Jerry Tomlinson (keyboards) and Ed Harrison (bass). Because his regular drummer Andrew Bowles is busy elsewhere, George has asked me to join his band for. It took me all of two seconds to accept.