The material on Umphrey's McGee's first studio album, Local Band Does O.K., is progressive in the sense that -- like early Phish -- it places an emphasis on complexly interlocking, deftly executed instrumental parts. It is music that is obviously challenging to play and seems to make a point in reveling in itself, though it is decidedly not challenging to the listener. There is little dissonance or sonic experimentation. That said, the band's sprawling excursions, which flip between arranged and i...   [ read more ]

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Having passed the ten-year mark, a milestone for any band, Umphrey's McGee have taken an increasingly deliberate approach to their career, attempting, for instance, to create a definitive representation of their concert performance in 2007's Live at the Murat (the equivalent for this group of the Grateful Dead's Live/Dead or the Allman Brothers Band's At Fillmore East), and taking a few years to come up with their fourth studio album, Mantis, for the first time working from scratch wit...   [ read more ]

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When "jam bands" began to infiltrate the music scene in the '90s, it seemed like fans were content to hear bands jamming away for hours on end -- a la a Grateful Dead show. But later in the decade, these Dead offspring began to branch out into other musical styles -- even going so far as to streamline their compositions to start resembling actual songs. A good example of this is the third studio album overall by Umphrey's McGee, Safety in Numbers. With more than half of the album's compositions...   [ read more ]

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