Instrumental quartet Circles Around the Sun teamed with drummer Joe Russo to improvise during a recording session held earlier this year at Russo’s Brooklyn studio. Highlights from the jam session will be released as the four-song Circles Around The Sun Meets Joe Russo EP on October 18. CATS and Russo unveiled the track “Peace Reprise” from the forthcoming EP and Circles Around The Sun also confirmed a fall tour.

“All of the members of CATS have been friends with Joe Russo for years between our collaborations with Phil Lesh, Cass McCombs and others. We thought it would be a great idea to do a project with him, so we met up in a studio in Brooklyn and wound up creating four songs in one day,” said Circles Around The Sun guitarist Neal Casal. “The session had a true CATS in the moment vibe with explosive improvisation, double drums between Joe and our drummer Mark Levy, conversational guitars with me and Dan Horne, and plenty of Adam MacDougall keyboard wizardry.”


“I was excited when Neal reached out about the possibility of this collaboration. Having played with Neal and Adam many times before over the years, and my time spent with Dan on Cass Mccombs gigs and sessions, it felt like a no brainer,” added Russo. “I was also psyched to do some double drums with Mark, especially in this context. Hope to do it again one day.”

Legendary recording engineer Jim Scott mixed the release with CATS’ Dan Horne. The EP is available for pre-order here. Circles Around The Sun will kick off their fall tour at The Crocodile in Seattle on October 16. A West Coast swing also includes dates in Portland, San Francisco, Sacramento and Los Angeles. Then, the quartet heads to Colorado to end the year with stops in Denver on December 27, Fort Collins on December 29 and Buena Vista on New Year’s Eve.

Listen to “Peace Reprise” below:


Circles Around The Sun Meets Joe Russo Tracklist

When I Was At Peace Get It Right The First Time Added Addition Peace Reprise