A moody debut from the dexterous multi-instrumentalist

Pune-based musician Shreyas Iyengar handles everything from saxophone to drums, guitar and keys on his debut solo offering Tough Times. It’s an arresting modern jazz album with a wordless yet powerful sense of storytelling. There’s a gentle tone to “Homage”, while fluid bass lines and sax charge together on “Quarrel Times”. He sounds markedly morose on the choir-aided “Death March”, and then offers smooth jams with “Trouble in the Orient” and the flute-inflected “Never Leaving Home Again”. Like the troubled times that inspired the album, Tough Times is cacophonous yet introspective.