The Necks have confounded critics from Sydney to South America with a musical style that is impossible to pigeonhole.

Described as avant garde, post jazz and ambient freefall, the only thing most can agree on is that The Necks are redefining music.

This genre-defying, Antipodean trio have individually worked in every style of music from pop to film soundtracks, and have toured with a long list of luminaries from Midnight Oil to Barney Kessel and Gary Bartz. Between them they feature on over 160 albums.

Despite their ubiquity, it is playing together as The Necks that Chris Abrahams (piano), Lloyd Swanton (bass) and Tony Buck (drums) have struck creative gold. Since the late Eighties they have released 11 albums.

Their live performance takes the audience on a musical odyssey, wholly improvised but rooted in technical mastery, deliberate delivery and a sense of structure. Long atmospheric pieces which radiate the warmth and surprise of spontaneous music are typically underpinned by deep, insistent grooves.

"We got together as a way of investigating music and influences we felt weren't being satisfied in other bands we were working in," says Tony. "I think we felt a desire to play a music that had time and space to develop outside of the jazz soloist/accompaniment type dynamic. We were all listening to things like dub, soul, Afrobeat and gamelan and the trance groove and minimalist elements in those musics were a big influence.

"At the time we were enjoying the 'vamp till ready' sections of pieces we did with jazz-type bands better than the actual bit where the sax player goes off for 20 minutes."

In concert The Necks attempt to start each piece with as clean a slate as possible and then let it gradually unravel. It is a beguiling and beautiful process that invariably intoxicates the listener.

"Someone starts with one idea and we then deal with that material using the 'Necks' approach," says Tony. "In a way, that's the aproach we have used since the band was formed.

"In that sense, our improvisation is very different to free impro, as we do have things we tend to do and not do."

So, what's a music lover to make of this elusive lot?

"I hope that people find themselves immersed in the music and swept away, says Tony "I hope they're surprised by the journey as much as we are when the music is really happening, because we have no idea where it might go either.

"In that sense, our position in the process isn't that different to the audience."

Starts 8pm, tickets cost £12.50 (SOLD OUT). Call 01273 709709.