 By 1984 (and while coming off the end of a four-year King Crimson reunion) Bruford's interest in playing jazz had been revived by his improvising piano-and-drums partnership with Patrick Moraz.By now a firm advocate and endorser of the Simmons electronic drumkit, Bruford began to explore how this instrument could be introduced into a creative jazz context.Bruford initially established Earthworks in 1986 as The Bill Bruford Quartet with a line-up of himself on acoustic and Simmons drums, Django Bates on keyboards, tenor horn and trumpet, Iain Ballamy on saxophone and Mick Hutton on double bass.