CB3 - Aeons (The Sign Records)

CB3 does not sing to you. They set the room on fire and leave the story in the riff.

The name is the pitch in miniature: Charlotta’s Burning Trio. Three players from Malmö, led by guitarist Charlotta Andersson, with Pelle Lindsjö on bass and Natanael Salomonsson on drums. Formed in the early 2010s, they began in jazzier territory on a 2015 self-titled debut, then pushed outward — a live record, the short release Adventures, the 2018 album From Nothing to Eternity — until heavy psych, progressive pulse, and stoner weight took over. By the time they reached The Sign Records, press was already calling them the King Crimson of Malmö. That oversells the cleverness and undersells the burn. Think early Pink Floyd’s drift, Hendrix’s echo-shred, Mahavishnu’s rhythmic nerve, and a desert-rock low end, played as one instrumental language.

Aeons is the record where that language locks in. Released February 28, 2020, just before the pandemic shut the stages they were built for, it is their label debut and third full-length: five tracks, about 32 minutes, no vocals, no filler. The band’s own image for it is simple — stars above, evil below, and fire in between. A trinity at peace for aeons.

The sequence is a climb and a descent. “Zodiac” opens on a fuzzy, repetitive riff and refuses subtlety. “Sonic Blaze” stretches the patterns, progressive without copying anyone, a little evil creeping into the haze. “Acid Haze,” the nine-minute centerpiece, is the drop: down-tuned, melancholy, Sabbath-slow, then a Hendrixian wash that runs out as far as the trio can go before the snare pulls it back. “Warrior Queen” comes back triumphant, sweeping rather than crushed. “Apocalypse” strips to acoustic guitar and a floatier tune, then ends on saxophone — the last-chance saloon move that sums the record up. Planned like a jam, executed like a journey.

That is the point of CB3. The studio cut is the map; the live show is the territory. Solos are improvised, intensity shifts, every song becomes a different song. When gigs vanished, they answered with Aeons Live Sessions (2021), three of these tracks blown out to nearly half an hour at Signalverket in Malmö. Shared stages with Monolord, Kikagaku Moyo, Hällas, and Firebreather had already made the case: this is music for a room, headphones second.