Hedvig Mollestad Trio Share New Ballad 'Lament'

04-09-2025

(TS) Hedvig Mollestad Trio will release Bees in the Bonnett on May 9 via Rune Grammofon. This is the eighth album from a band that continues to blur boundaries between free jazz, proggy rock, and blithe psychedelia with its signature telepathic chemistry, nuanced sonority, and uplifting spirit.

HM3 released "Golden Griffin" to announce the LP, and today, the trio shares a dreamily delicate follow-up, "Lamament," a tribute to Mollestad's father as the catalyst of her musical passion. The track also honors the band's tradition of featuring one ballad on each album.

Mollestad says, "Since the record as a whole is a lot of bite, fury, joy, frustration, fear and all those big feelings processed through heavy riffs and beats, and searing solos, 'Lamament' serves more like a calm place, a state of being, a pulse in where you can just simply relax."

After an outpouring of seven acclaimed albums over a decade, accompanied by rapturously received touring all over Europe and North America, it's been nearly four years since the Hedvig Mollestad Trio released its triumphal seventh album, Ding Dong. You're Dead. Mollestad's pent-up delight in reconnecting with cofounders Ellen Brekken (bass) and Ivar Loe Bjørnstad (drums) pervades Bees in the Bonnet's thirty-seven invigorating, beautifully baffling, yet accessible minutes. Always self-producing and releasing records solely through Rune Grammofon, HM3 has created its own fascinating sonic universe, offering fans a singular aural experience that's earned a global cult following.

With the Hedvig Mollestad Trio lately playing as many rock clubs as jazz venues, Bees in the Bonnet is perhaps Mollestad's most even-handed exploration of both styles to date, indebted equally to compatriot jazz guitarist/composer Terje Rypdal and Texas boogie rockers ZZ Top, Canadian proggers Rush, and her psych rock Norwegian labelmates Motorpsycho. "There are open parts, but also there are structures in this record that are very long, quite complicated, and written out as a score," said Mollestad, who has also played with Nels Cline, Trevor Dunn, Colin Stetson, Ingrid Laubrock, and Shahzad Ismaily.

Bees in the Bonnet will be accompanied by at least one music video plus extensive touring across Europe in the summer and fall of 2025 before making a long-awaited return to America in 2026, continuing to satiate and intrigue fans of both hard rock and open-hearted jazz with rare dynamism and seductive panache.