Umphrey’s McGee – “Out of Focus (Lego 4)”
Blueprints (Nothing Too Fancy Music)

Umphrey’s McGee have released Blueprints, their first full-length album since 2022’s Asking for a Friend. With their long-awaited return to the studio, the pioneering quintet looked to their time-honored traditions of live composition and embracing community feedback, stitching together a new stable of originals entirely from compiled onstage inspiration.

All six of the daunting entries on Blueprints were debuted during the recurring “Raw Stewage” section of Umphrey’s McGee’s annual UMBowl events. Year after year, fans have voted on their favorite next-level jams that veered into wholly original creations–affectionately termed “Jimmy Stewarts”–to be cut down and recombined to form new songs. Many of these fan-selected Frankenstein songs have become instant classics; “Den,” which debuted at UMBowl III in 2012, has been staged 82 times since. “Wide Open,” “Exit Signs,” “Unevolved” and “Out of Focus,” the album’s first four tracks, all trace back to UMBowl IX in 2022, while the closing cut “Concessions” is the newest, with origins at 2024’s UMBowl X. 

The songs’ convoluted path to the new album endured yet another layer of jam-ception in their recording at the Top Note Sessions in December 2024, set on the fourth floor of the Metro in their Chicago homebase. Before their nightly live recording sessions with a hometown crowd, the band worked up the songs with additional layers of vocals and instrumentation in daytime studio sessions in the same space.

The result of all this is a shapeshifting testament to Umphrey’s McGee’s catholic tastes, jam prowess and one-of-one approach. On Blueprints’ digital release, Umphrey’s McGee gave fans a look at just how the sausage gets made by breaking the tracklist down to its 24 original fragments. While gems abound throughout, like the blissful canons of “Out of Focus (Lego 4),” the only sensible place to start is the beginning.

Jeff Tweedy – “Lou Reed Was My Babysitter”
Single from Twilight Override (Sept. 26 via dBpm Records)

It’s safe to say that “Lou Reed Was My Babysitter” shows a different side to Jeff Tweedy’s solo career—a shadow-lit, eyeliner-smeared bandleader adopting the proto-punk pulse of the Velvet Underground, much like the 1970s-era “Rock & Roll.” It whines like a rock-informed poet with something important to say, and yes, requires a bit of headbanging upon tempo shifts that will likely leave you singing, “The dead don’t die, the dead don’t die, the dead don’t die!”

And to be clear, Reed wasn’t Tweedy’s babysitter, but his records were… Which is to say, “You know his life was saved by rock ‘n’ roll.”

Hana Gustafson

Tedeschi Trucks Band & Leon Russell – “The Letter [Live at LOCKN’ / 2015]”
Mad Dogs & Englishmen Revisited Live at LOCKN’ (Swamp Family Music)

At 2015’s LOCKN’ Festival, Tedeschi Trucks Band joined forces with Leon Russell to revive the music of the legendary 1970 tour Mad Dogs & Englishmen. The Grammy-winning Southern-rock ensemble and certified rock icon assembled a cast of innovators from across generations for an exhilarating tribute to the late Joe Cocker, pooling their talents for an unforgettable performance that simultaneously honored the music’s roots and looked forward to its future. Today, to mark the collaboration’s 10th anniversary, Tedeschi Trucks Band have released the long-awaited concert recordings as Mad Dogs & Englishmen Revisited Live at LOCKN’.

Mad Dogs & Englishmen Revisited captured the spirit of Cocker and Russell’s Mad Dogs & Englishmen tour 45 years after it blazed across the States. All 12 remaining members joined the Tedeschi Trucks Band and Russell to reignite the memory of their original run, amounting to an all-star ensemble including Rita Coolidge, Warren Haynes, Chris Robinson, Jim Keltner, Dave Mason, Claudia Lennear, Steve Earle, Chris Stainton and more. At its most energetic moments, the performance packed more than 20 players on the festival stage for electrifying takes on classics like “Feelin’ Alright,” “The Weight,” “She Came In Through The Bathroom Window,” “Cry Me a River” and rock-and-soul anthem “The Letter,” which is led by roaring lead vocals from Susan Tedeschi.

“Having the opportunity to work with Leon Russell and the cast of Mad Dogs & Englishmen was a dream. I am still pinching myself over the entire experience,” Tedeschi recalled in a release. “The LOCKN’ Music Festival has done a tremendous job creating so many wonderful music collaborations for us. This was one for the ages. The audience was amazing and the performers and the music were all at the highest level. This is a memory I will always cherish.”

Read Derek Trucks’ reflections on the process behind the Mad Dogs & Englishmen Revisited performance and its recording in a new Relix interview.

Guerilla Toss – “CEO of Personal & Pleasure”
You’re Weird Now (Sub Pop Records)

Guerilla Toss have returned with their sixth studio album, You’re Weird Now. The New York-based avant-garde psych-punk ensemble’s latest offering makes good use of their ever-expanding Rolodex of high-profile fans: Trey Anastasio provided his Vermont recording facility, The Barn, for studio sessions, while Stephen Malkmus produced the project. Crossings with those icons and more renewed the band’s focus and confidence, which primed them for some of their most inventive and powerful work yet.

“His incredibly relatable down-to-earth approach to music and trusting yourself as an artist had a massive effect on this album and myself as a musician,” Guerilla Toss vocalist Kassie Carlson said of refining the album’s sound with the Pavement frontman. “Working with Malkmus, Bryce Goggin, Trey Anastasio, touring with Primus—all of that made me realize that what I’m doing is not wrong. The work is clear, important, and necessary. It’s not always easy or clear in direction or purpose, but creating, making, performing music is vital to my life, and a healthy earth.”

You’re Weird Now is a brain-melting, pupil-dilating, big-dumb-grin-inducing trip. Guerilla Toss’ sound flags wildly from track to track. “Red Flag to Angry Bull” is a shimmering, sauntering and very ‘90s anthem, featuring shredding from Anastasio and backing vocals from Malkmus. “Life’s a Zoo,” also featuring Malkmus, stacks thrashing drums and frantic vocals over a jailbroken chiptune foundation. Clouds of vaporwave synth drift through the heavy emo-esque chords of “When Dogs Bark.” “CEO of Personal & Pleasure” is jagged, reeling and caught between chaotic post-rock and an ‘80s news intro. Throughout, it’s sheer overwhelming ecstasy.

Grateful Dead – “Franklin’s Tower (Reprise) – Live at Great American Music Hall, San Francisco, CA, Soundcheck/Rehearsal, 8/12/1975”
Blues for Allah (50th Anniversary Deluxe Edition) (Rhino)

On September 1, the Grateful Dead’s Blues for Allah turned 50. Emerging from a period of creative reinvention in their first and longest touring hiatus, the band’s eighth studio album is widely recognized as one of their most forward-thinking and successful offerings; by incorporating Middle Eastern scales and thematic influences into their adventurous jazz-fusion-oriented sound, they group created enduring staples like “Franklin’s Tower,” “Help on the Way,” “Slipknot!” and “The Music Never Stopped.” Today, to properly honor the project’s golden anniversary, Rhino released an expanded deluxe edition.

Blues for Allah (50th Anniversary Deluxe Edition) packages the original album alongside two extra discs that demonstrate how its standards continued to develop in early stagings. Nine tracks were captured during rehearsal and sound check at San Francisco’s Great American Music Hall on Aug. 12, 1975, one of the band’s four performances in 1975, during which they introduced songs from their new album to hometown fans before its release. Eight are taken from the Dead’s two-night engagement at Pennsylvania’s Tower Theatre on June 21 and 22, 1976. Five were played at Bill Graham’s SNACK (Students Need Athletics, Culture, and Kicks) Benefit at San Francisco’s Kezar Stadium on March 23, 1975, including one of only four known performances of “King Solomon’s Marbles.”

Alongside the new batch of rarities, the Blues for Allah (50th Anniversary Deluxe Edition) is coupled with a unique interactive Playing in the Band experience, which allows fans to mix the original recordings–raising, lowering or muting each individual performer’s parts–to their preference. Read more about the digital companion here.

Tortoise – “Layered Presence”
Single from Touch (Oct. 24 via International Anthem Recording Co.

On Tuesday, Tortoise announced Touch, their first new album in nine years. Set for release via International Anthem and Nonesuch Records on Oct. 24, the revered Chicago post-rock ensemble’s first full-length offering since 2016’s The Catastrophist reunites bandmates Dan Bitney, John Herndon, Douglas McCombs, John McEntire and Jeff Parker from their independent careers to reveal how their shared perspective has evolved after nearly a decade apart.

Touch diverges meaningfully from the intimate, free associative process that thrived in Tortoise’s shared loft space in the ‘90s. The bandmates, now spread between Los Angeles, Portland, Ore. and their Chicago hometown, co-wrote all of the tracks together, then recorded their parts from their respective cities.

Despite their years apart and physical distance, the magnetic, many-sided sound of the new single “Layered Presence” is proof positive that the band’s unrestrained collaboration is alive and well; loops of tumbling drums and a deep, ionized low-end distantly recall their early triumphs, then build to an angular peak with synthetic harpsichord and guitar bolts. Their latest offering follows “Organesson,” a dense arrangement of percussion and inviting strums, and, as ever, an implacable alloy of atmospheric jazz, krautrock, dub, dismantled techno and other loose ends.

Spin Doctors – “Still a Gorilla”
Face Full of Cake (Capitol Records)

In April, Spin Doctors made their triumphant return with Face Full of Cake, their first studio album in 12 years. The ‘90s alt-rock forerunners’ long-awaited revival is their seventh full-length record to date, and their first since 2013’s If the River was Whiskey. After 35 years of performing, the group opened up their new chapter by looking back on their roots and reviving the hallmarks of their heyday with the finely-tuned perspective of veteran musicians. The album’s first single, “Still a Gorilla,” introduced a group raring to go again with a fuzz-drenched garage rock vehicle for their trademark tongue-in-cheek lyrics.

Spin Doctors took their new release on the road through the summer with an expansive co-headline tour alongside Blues Traveler and Spin Doctors. “To tell the truth, I was a little intimidated by the prospect of touring in a bus this summer. It can be grueling. For the most part, Spin Doctors have toured by air for the last 10 or so years,” frontman Chris Barron wrote for a feature in the latest issue of Relix. “However, after the first show of the run at Red Rocks, as the bus pulled out onto the highway, a wild sensation of freedom opened up in my chest and I remembered what it felt like when I was this 20-year-old kid on the open road with nothing to do but play rock-and-roll and get to the next gig.”

Get an inside look at Spin Doctors’ summer tour with photos and commentary from the band here.

This week’s Relix Staff Picks dispatch also features tracks from Widespread Panic, John Prine, Pharoah Sanders, Neal Casal, Andrew Bird, Kassa Overall, TAUK, Parcels, Djo, Gruff Rhys and many more. Tune in here.