Let’s reminisce: I first encountered Trumpets of Death at a particularly windswept festival in Harrogate in 2010. To say that the quartet’s full-tilt assault on the senses – albeit a convincing aural equivalent of the gusty winds ripping through the site – came as a shock for a fan of frontman Ben Wetherill’s graceful solo acoustic takes on traditional British folk balladry would qualify for consideration as the understatement of the year. In fact, the outfit’s skronk-infested disembowelments of melancholy folk songs proved a particularly effective bouncer – braving the distinctly uninviting elements seemed like an appealing prospect all of a sudden.

So maybe it’s understandable if the outfit’s debut album was initially placed in the hi-fi with an air of nervous trepidation. All of which makes the alluring depths of the record all the more impressive. Not that much has changed: the line-up’s the same, and many of these five tunes have been in the live set for some time. And the sound’s exactly the same. Imagine a violent collision between an acapella-favouring clear-voiced trad-folk purist and a collective of the most avant-garde jazz cats around, and you’re not far from this arm-wrestling match between ancient song forms, ear-slapping blasts of free jazz, atonal drones and deliberately abrasive tones, all served with family-sized dollops of gothic gloom.

Yet, or perhaps precisely because of this, Teeth + Teeth = Teeths emerges as a genuinely hypnotic, habit-forming listening experience. Perhaps appropriately for a wildly arranged version of a musty folk song about the sailor’s life, ‘The Press Gang’ whips up a drone that rages and bubbles like a stormy sea, the track’s musical abrasiveness beautifully balanced by Wetherill’s calm croon. Even better is original song ‘The Paper Plough’. Opening with a sound not unlike a procession of severely hungover trolls marching to work, the oompah flavours and an ongoing distress signal emerging from an unidentifiable wind instrument deliciously contrasted by a sweet melody and sighing harmonies, the track eventually blooms into a furious blast of brass-powered swirl not a million miles removed from mid-80s Tom Waits racing through a booze-riddled bazaar. ‘Jason’, meanwhile, hovers in the air ominously like a less self-consciously demonic incarnation of Black Sabbath’s eponymous metal classic.

Sure, things get a bit trying towards the end, with the seemingly endless, throat singing-empowered drone the soothing calm of ‘Woodrows Lament’ erupts into and a jaggedly spiky take on trad. arr. seafaring lament ‘Cruel Ships Captain’ both braving the no man’s land between experimental and plain mental. The air of slightly self-conscious boundary-pushing never quite evaporates, but when Trumpets of Death fire on all cylinders, which they do frequently here, magic ensues.