Uncla Acid

"After Hours" has become a widespread calling card for the area between midnight and twilight, when all the city falls asleep except for a collective of nocturnal beings. A whole new range of attitudes - diverse styles, open perception. After Hours is when the machine turns off -and when the mind turns on. In musical terms, it is the region outside categorization, the music that slips beyond the average stream of beats. It's not based on any beat pattern. After Hours is not ambient; nor is it acid-jazz, it's the area that exists in the gray area between them. Too quirky to hold any cliches too tightly; too loose for any grand agendas. After Hours eases the mind, softens the palette and opens the door to a new day.

Arguably the most radical album of their career to date, Nell' Ora Blu stands out like a blood-soaked beacon in the sterile desert of rock 'n' roll in 2024. What this dazzling detour tells us about the future of Uncle Acid & The Deadbeats remains a mystery, but after such a rich and fruitful artistic indulgence, Starr's reputation as one of heavy music's most distinctive voices can only grow. An eccentric tour-de-force, Nell' Ora Blu is the band's magnum opus. You will have nightmares. Trust no one. Watch your back. Let the blood flow…

Arguably the most radical album of their career to date, Nell' Ora Blu stands out like a blood-soaked beacon in the sterile desert of rock 'n' roll in 2024. What this dazzling detour tells us about the future of Uncle Acid & The Deadbeats remains a mystery, but after such a rich and fruitful artistic indulgence, Starr's reputation as one of heavy music's most distinctive voices can only grow. An eccentric tour-de-force, Nell' Ora Blu is the band's magnum opus. You will have nightmares. Trust no one. Watch your back. Let the blood flow…

As the hippie movement hurdled towards its emanate demise, bad vibes infiltrated the rock world. Tainted LSD, loud motorcycles, and a series of brutal deaths spawned inspiration for guitar-wielding teenagers across the globe. Implementing deafening fuzz and satanic screams to create their proto-metal monstrosities, short-lived stoner bands pressed their lysergic experiments in microscopic quantities before blacking out entirely. Lifted from the ashes of the acid rock hell fire are 18 distorted tales of dope fiends, pill poppers, and the baddest of trips.

Arguably the most radical album of their career to date, Nell' Ora Blu stands out like a blood-soaked beacon in the sterile desert of rock 'n' roll in 2024. What this dazzling detour tells us about the future of Uncle Acid & The Deadbeats remains a mystery, but after such a rich and fruitful artistic indulgence, Starr's reputation as one of heavy music's most distinctive voices can only grow. An eccentric tour-de-force, Nell' Ora Blu is the band's magnum opus. You will have nightmares. Trust no one. Watch your back. Let the blood flow…

Willis "Gator" Jackson's initial reputation was made as a honking and screaming tenor saxophonist with Cootie Williams' late-'40s orchestra and on his own R&B-ish recordings. By 1959, Jackson had de-emphasized some of his more extroverted sounds (although they occasionally popped up) and had reemerged as a solid swinger influenced by Gene Ammons and (on ballads) Ben Webster. This CD reissue from 1998 brings back in full two of Jackson's 1959-60 LPs: Blue Gator and Cookin' Sherry. Some of the music (which often falls into the soul-jazz genre) is reminiscent of the funky groove music that would become popular in the late '60s. Jackson sounds fine and is joined throughout by guitarist Bill Jennings, organist Jack McDuff, one of three bassists, one of two drummers, and sometimes Buck Clarke on conga. The accessible music alternates between warm ballads and jump tunes.