28 September 2026

JEFFREY ALEXANDER + THE HEAVY LIDDERS – Liquid Donnon (2026, LP/CD, Riot Season-UK/Feeding Tube-USA, Pome Pome Tones)

RELEASE INFO:

Label: Riot Season (UK) / Feeding Tube (USA) / Pome Pome Tones

Format: LP, Album, Limited Edition, Transparent Blue Vinyl, 500 copies

Format: LP+CDr, Album, Limited Edition, Transparent Blue Vinyl (Includes bonus CDr ‘The Man And The Journey’ and download coupon), 100 copies

Format: CDr, Album, Limited Edition, Digipak (includes a bonus track)

Release Date: 12 June 2026

Release Date (CD+Bonus Track): 16 Oct 2026

Jeffrey Alexander has been digging his own tunnel through the underground for a very long time. From The Iditarod and Black Forest/Black Sea to Dire Wolves and his countless collaborations, releases and sonic experiments, he has always seemed more interested in opening doors than in finding a fixed musical home. With The Heavy Lidders, that restless spirit has taken another form — a strange, living organism where deep psychedelia, dusty folk, cosmic jazz, free improvisation and the spirit of the Grateful Dead can all meet without anybody telling them where they are supposed to go.

“Liquid Donnon” is exactly the kind of record I would expect from such a place, yet it still manages to surprise. The guitars wander, the rhythm section keeps the whole thing breathing, saxophones and vibraphone appear from some distant dimension, and Christina Carter’s voice turns into another instrument rather than simply “singing” over the music. This is psychedelic music without the safety net: music that stretches, drifts, jams, collapses into silence and suddenly finds another road. It feels played rather than constructed, but there is always something underneath holding the whole trip together.

There is also something deeply personal hiding behind these long, winding pieces. The album takes its name from Donnon, Jeffrey’s late friend, whose 1989 Grateful Dead concert photograph became the cover image. So beneath all the cosmic drifting, fuzz, free-form exploration and beautifully unruly guitar work, there is memory — the kind that survives through sound. And perhaps that is what makes “Liquid Donnon” more than just another psychedelic improv record. It feels like a gathering of ghosts, friends, musicians and old musical spirits, all meeting for one more long night with the amplifiers switched on.

The album first appeared on vinyl back in June, but now, in October, “Liquid Donnon” returns in a new CD edition, this time with a bonus track added to the journey. A slightly different doorway into the same strange universe — so, enough talking… Let’s have a closer look/listen…

“From Loch Raven To Fells Point” opens the album slowly, under an improvisational scale and mood, with Jeffrey Alexander’s sweet, soft, and slightly hazy, almost Stoned-like vocals setting the scene before the band gradually unfolds an elegant psychedelic jam. And yes, this is surely pretty close to Jerry Garcia’s legendary jams, the kind of music that makes you feel as if it’s a sunny day and you’re sitting outside 710 Ashbury Street, lazy and completely lost in time, while from somewhere inside The Dead are playing an endless, intoxicated, mind-bending lysergic jam. You simply cannot move anymore; all you can do is use your Head and Mynd, travelling towards other dimensions. “Calliope Wailer” stretches the journey into an astonishing ten-minute piece of improvisational psychedelic music with a strong jazzy edge, courtesy of Tacuma Bradley’s lovely and intriguing saxophone. It almost feels acoustic at first, carrying that experimental “let’s start with one note and see where it takes us” attitude, before Drew Gardner’s vibraphone enters with a distinctive, soft, and sophisticated touch. Alexander’s guitar joins the conversation, bringing that wonderfully lazy psychedelic feeling of the late-1968 Dead, while Scott Verrastro’s hand drums masterfully fill every little gap. Then comes “Tightroping”, a slow, improvised and experimental number where Christina Carter of Texas noise-psych legends Charalambides contributes her wordless vocals. Guitar, WERp box, vibraphone, bass and bowed percussion gather around her voice to create a deeply dark and mystagogic atmosphere, a late-night Head Trip where anything becomes possible as long as you remain open-eyed, open-eared and, most importantly, open-minded. “Critical Masses” takes things into heavier territory, although the Heavy Lidders remain on the same tortuously slow, improvisational and jammy path. Lazy psychedelic wah-wah guitar blends with sax, bass and drums, while Alexander continues with those wonderfully “stoned” vocals, sounding almost like a psychedelic preacher delivering a sermon from some distant cosmic temple. Yes, you are inside Jeffrey’s Church of Cosmic Psych now — wow! And then comes the massive “Reservoir Drop/The Summer Song”, a twelve-minute journey where the band seems to have decided to freely throw some acid into the air. This is 60s-inspired jammy psychedelia for the 21st century, with Jeffrey Alexander handling guitar, Moog and melodica, alongside the distinct presence of bass and drums, while Christina Carter’s ethereal, wordless vocals literally float all over the place. The first part develops as a lysergically trippy, mind-bending improvised piece, but when the second part arrives, and Christina’s voice enters, the whole thing is transformed into a hallucinogenic, hypnotic, mind-expanding “thing” that simply gets stuck inside your brain. What a trip! Finally, the bonus track “The Ocean Will Have Us All”, recorded live at The Portland Arms in Cambridge on August 4, 2026, begins with a strange and slightly creepy introduction, Christina once again doing her own mysterious thing, giving the opening a kind of ceremonial feeling. Acoustic, experimental and improvisational, it sounds like the beginning of another ritual rather than the end of an album — and somehow that feels exactly right for The Heavy Lidders…

In conclusion, “Liquid Donnon” is not an album that asks you to sit down and simply listen — it asks you to surrender to the journey. Jeffrey Alexander and The Heavy Lidders understand something that many improvisational bands seem to forget: a jam becomes truly psychedelic when it has a soul, when the musicians listen to each other and allow the music to breathe, wander and occasionally lose itself. Here, the ghosts of the 60s, the Deadhead spirit, cosmic jazz and free-form psychedelia are not museum pieces; they are still alive, moving through these six pieces in their own strange way. Put the record on, turn off the lights, open your mind and let the Heavy Lidders take you somewhere else. The trip is worth taking… Far out, Man! Dig it! TimeLord Michalis

Tracklist

A1	From Loch Raven To Fells Point	7:09
A2	Calliope Wailer	10:01
A3	Tightroping	4:27
B1	Critical Masses	7:48
B2	Reservoir Drop/The Summer Song	12:42
CDr Bonus Track	The Ocean Will Have Us All (live at The Portland Arms, Cambridge, UK, August 4, 2026)	14:03