Inhalt: "Ding Dong. You're Dead." marks the return of Norwegian guitarist and composer Hedwig Mollestad's return to her long-standing trio with bassist Ellen Brekken and drummer Ivar Loe Bjørnstad, just eight months after she led a sextet on Ekhidna, her first solo album. This outing marks her trio's tenth anniversary. While it's impossible to say for sure, it seems that the more jazz-forward musical signature of Ekhidna informed these proceedings. There's a different feel at work - there's more jazz-rock than Black Sabbath reflected in Mollestad's still-molten guitar approach. In another shift, this date marks the group's first to feature compositions from Brekken, and she turns in two of the best on this set.Unlike most albums cut in the pandemic year of 2020, Ding Dong. You're Dead. was recorded by the group working together in the studio, not sending in tracks or showing up to the room separately. As such, an organic musical kineticism just drips from these grooves.The Brekken-penned opener "Leo Flash' Return to the Underworld" commences with a series of spiky, syncopated guitar riffs that simultaneously recall the King Crimson of Red and the Mahavishnu Orchestra of Visions of the Emerald Beyond. Her knotty, overdriven vamp is buoyed by a circular bass riff that moves in ever-widening, harmonically rich circles, and Bjørnstad's interlocking kick drum and tom-toms are underscored by fluid, authoritative cymbal work. Mollestad constructs a high-flying solo that registers the influences of both Bill Connors and Sonny Sharrock. "All Flights Canceled" directly references the handiwork of the pandemic in urgent rushes of punchy rock & roll riffs that bridge Dick Dale and Ray Russell. The title track moans into existence thanks to Brekken's resonant, canny arco playing. Her sonorous bow improvises across the lower register as Mollestad adds a spiny, moody, and minimal blues vamp atop sparse, syncopated percussion from Bjørnstad. "Gimbal" is a true intersection of hard stoner rock and refracted jazz harmonics. Slow