Circles Around The Sun (CATS) have announced the release of their latest album, “Interludes for the Dead: Volume 2”, on 7th November 2025. Volume 1 comprised the music composed for the set breaks at the iconic former Grateful Dead members’ “Fare Thee Well” shows in Chicago and Santa Clara in the summer of 2015. Those shows also marked the 50th anniversary of the Grateful Dead. Their 60th anniversary was celebrated over the weekend of 1st to 3rd August 2025 with Dead and Company plus special guests in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park.
Following the untimely passing of Casal in 2019, remaining members Adam MacDougall (keys), Dan Horne (bass), and Mark Levy (drums) chose to honour his wish for them to carry on, ultimately welcoming guitarist John Lee Shannon into the fold as a permanent member. From its Deadhead roots, CATS has grown into an expansive blend of psychedelic post-rock space boogie who have collaborated with the likes Joe Russo, Billy Strings, and Mikaela Davis.
Horne, CATS bass player and producer says “It felt important to make a 10 years later companion piece, and share it for the Grateful Dead’s 60th anniversary, 10 years from the “Fare Thee Well” shows that we were commissioned to do the house music for- that our friend Neal Casal brought us all together for and keep carrying that torch. We spent four days together at my UHF Studio, writing and recording it all on the spot, to capture that spirit of improvisation and spontaneity.”
Pre-order link can be found here.
‘Golden Boot’ is a glimpse into “Interludes for the Dead: Volume 2”was recorded in just four days, with nothing written or rehearsed beforehand, all of the music was created on the spot and tracked immediately with little to no overdubs.
Horne adds: “‘Golden Boot’ sounds like a classic CATS jam. Could have been written at any time over the last decade. We tend to come up with a groove that allows the framework for us to explore and improvise around and then go to outer space with.”
