Instant's 32 tracks feature shifting duos and trios of musicians performing on a wide array of conventional (electric guitars, reeds, brass, etc.)

[4] Though the entire album could have fit onto one 70-minute CD, the band formatted it for a briefer listening experience with each of Instant's 35-minute discs containing 16 short tracks.

He writes that the "collection covers a lot of ground, from noisy vignettes in the vein of Fred Frith and Chris Cutler's workouts to subdued passages that recall even atonal avant-garde classical works; AMM and Derek Bailey also spring to mind.

Instant is not all free-form, however -- in fact, the forms are held together by vague folk themes and the band's classic angular Captain Beefheart-like arrangements."

He concludes by writing that the "two-CD set is certainly substantial in covering the band's multifaceted work, and with a group this unique and with so many compelling approaches that mix folk, punk, free jazz, and ethnic forms in such a singular fashion, there are few other recordings of this nature around.