Pulling more than 200 people into a converted Marrickville warehouse on a cold Friday night is an achievement for any musical act. Doing it with an evening of wholly improvised music is something else again.

But such is the draw of BELIEVE, the quartet of Peter Farrar, Novak Manojlovic, Clayton Thomas and Laurence Pike, whose long-form spontaneous compositions occupy a space adjacent to free jazz but ultimately resist categorisation.

Before they take the floor (there is no stage at the multifunctional 21 Shepherd), pianist Mike Nock and guitarist Hilary Geddes warm up the room with a beautifully judged duo set of understated improvisations that settles the audience before gently nudging it towards more exploratory terrain. After a short break, BELIEVE picks up the thread and runs with it to celebrate the release of a new album, Nature’s God.

BELIEVE at 21 Shepherd St. Photo © Kathy Luu

It’s immediately apparent that the quartet functions as a leaderless organism. Rather than responding to one another’s ideas in turn, the four players seem to think and shape the music collectively in real time. Musical focus shifts almost imperceptibly between players; ideas emerge, dissolve and...