For the first time since her 2009 debut Entry, here Linda May Han Oh returns to the format of a “chordless” trio (i.e., a configuration without piano or guitar). Strange Heavens pairs the Malaysian Australian bassist and composer, who’s now based in New York City, with trumpeter Ambrose Akinmusire and drummer Tyshawn Sorey (Akinmusire was one-third of her trio on Entry, while Sorey is her rhythmic counterpart in the Vijay Iyer Trio). This improvisatory album showcases the wowing versatility of all three players: “Living Proof” opens with a bassline that could have come straight out of a spy thriller, only for the following “Acapella” to drop down to a comparative tiptoe as the players respond to Joni Mitchell’s vocal-only 1969 anti-war lament “The Fiddle and the Drum.” And whereas the title track moves with quiet intricacy, a later four-song suite takes inspiration from Shaun Tan’s wordless 2006 graphic novel The Arrival to sow notable unrest: Observe the tight, inward riffing from all three players on “Home,” and Oh’s lopsided and then scratchy bowed bass on “Folk Song.” The trio also reinterprets works by Geri Allen and Melba Liston, respectively, on the closing “Skin” and “Just Waiting”—representing a fairly relaxed comedown for an album that ranges dramatically between amiable and agitated.