Umphrey's McGee Build a Record Out of Their Own Jams on 'Blueprints'

Blueprints is out today, and the premise is the kind of thing Umphrey’s fans have been arguing for in parking lots for twenty years: take the improv, keep the improv, build the song around it.

The six-song record is the band’s 15th studio album and its first since 2022’s Asking for a Friend. Every track started as a live improvisation that fans voted on. The band then took those jams into a hidden theater above Chicago’s Metro last December and finished them out with lyrics and additional instrumentation.

It arrives during a genuinely transitional stretch for the band. Longtime drummer Kris Myers left in May, and Scotty Zwang, who had covered every show since, was made permanent in August.

Photo: jgullo, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons. Compiled from published reports.