Watch: Ant Law and Alex Hitchcock share video for ‘Outliers’ featuring Linda May Han Oh and Eric Harland

Same Moon In The Same World is the new album from two of the UK jazz scene’s most original voices – guitarist Ant Law and saxophonist Alex Hitchcock, and is due out on 4 November on Outside in Music. This collaborative, remotely recorded album features an international roster of guests, including Joel Ross, Eric Harland, Jasper Høiby, Linda May Han Oh, Kendrick Scott, Shai Maestro, Tim Garland, Ben Williams and Sun-Mi Hong, who come together to explore Law and Hitchcock’s reflective, conceptual compositions.

The first of many projects Law and Hitchcock have planned together, both players brought four compositions to the table for the album, developing and shaping them in tandem before sending them across the globe. “When no artists were able to tour, everyone had more time available to record. We discovered this almost by accident,” Law recalls. “We sent demos to our favourite players in the world and were delighted to hear that they were up for recording with us.” Their tales of collaboration involve artists taking the material in new directions, long hours painstakingly knitting it all together, and even ‘trading fours', pandemic-style; all participants would be online at the same time, where they’d play a few phrases, upload and email it over and get a spontaneous, musical response sent back.

The album takes its name from a line in Japanese author Haruki Murakami’s 1999 novel Sputnik Sweetheart: “we’re both looking at the same moon in the same world. We’re connected to reality by the same line.” That quote became a neat summation of the lockdown experience shared by musicians across the world, and this connection to others in a similar predicament became a theme running through the music Hitchcock and Law were writing. “I think this is one of the reasons the album is so melodically driven – we were trying to connect directly with people, rather than search and explore more abstract ideas.” But there’s more to the album than sweet melodies, the duo is searching for universal truths – musical language, human experience, emotional maturity – shared by musicians on different corners of the planet. Or, as they put it, “from our unique vantage points, we are all staring at the same moon.”

‘Outliers’ is released today 7 October – see the video below and to listen to the track visit music.outsideinmusic.com/outliers