[Update 8/14/25]: After a photo of Jimmy Herring, Oteil Burbridge, and Jeff Sipe with producer John Keane at his Athens, GA studio property on Wednesday sparked speculation from fans (and us, see below) about a potential revival of The Aquarium Rescue Unit—and a post shared by Oteil appeared not to dissuade the notion—Herring on Thursday confirmed that the three ARU veterans are hard at work on his latest solo album, set for a 2026 release via Abstract Logix Records.
The new album will mark the third studio release under Herring’s name following 2008’s self-produced Lifeboat and 2012’s John Keane-helmed Subject to Change Without Notice. Both of his prior albums were similarly released via Abstract Logix and featured numerous players from the extended Col. Bruce circle including Sipe, Burbridge, ARU regular Matt Slocum, Jimmy’s Codetalkers bandmate Bobby Lee Rodgers, late legends Ike Stubblefield and Kofi Burbridge, and many more.
“A long time coming,” Herring wrote in the caption for his post, which included a similar photo to the one that circulated on Wednesday, this time featuring only him, Sipe, Burbridge, and Keane. “The work has started for the next Jimmy Herring album for a 2026 release with Oteil Burbridge Jeff Sipe aka APT Q-258 and some very special guests. … We are all very excited to have Jimmy, Oteil and Jeff back recording together with the incredible John Keane.”
Abstract Logix founder Souvik Dutta confirmed to Live For Live Music that while the band lineup for the project features the three ARU co-founders, “There is no ARU without Bruce Hampton for us, the chapter is closed for the moment. This is a Jimmy Herring album.”
Dutta added that Herring and company will continue tracking this week and reconvene in November to finish when touring schedules allow. He also indicated that the group plans to perform live in support of the album once it is completed.
The news of a forthcoming Jimmy Herring album is all the more exciting considering the medical journey Herring has undergone in the past year. In June 0f 2024, news of his tonsil cancer diagnosis shocked the jam band community and prompted Widespread Panic to cancel its late-2024 tour plans. Herring eventually recovered and returned to the stage with Panic beginning in February of 2025 .
Scroll down to read more background on Jimmy Herring, Oteil Burbridge, and Jeff Sipe’s shared history with Col. Bruce Hampton & The Aquarium Rescue Unit and the decades-long connection between Herring and Abstract Logix. While you read, listen to the last Jimmy Herring album from 2012 via the player below.
Jimmy Herring – Subject to Change Without Notice (2012) – Full Album Playlist
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=videoseries
[Originally published 8/13/25, 5:30 p.m. ET as “Looks Like The Aquarium Rescue Unit Is Working On Something New…”]: A photo making the rounds on social media on Wednesday has stoked speculation about a revival of The Aquarium Rescue Unit, the beloved group led by the late Col. Bruce Hampton. The image shows three co-founding members of The Aquarium Rescue Unit—bassist Oteil Burbridge, guitarist Jimmy Herring, and drummer Jeff Sipe—together, reportedly at the Athens, GA studio of decorated record producer and engineer John Keane (Widespread Panic, Indigo Girls, R.E.M.).
[Photo via Souvik Dutta Facebook – (from left) Joel Bryon, Souvik Dutta, Jeff Sipe, Oteil Burbridge, Jimmy Herring, Dave George, John Keane]
Helmed by Hampton, the so-called “granddaddy of the jam band scene,” The Aquarium Rescue Unit took part in the foundational opening year of H.O.R.D.E. Tour in 1992 alongside Phish, Widespread Panic, Blues Traveler, and The Spin Doctors. The most well-known iteration of the group, which underwent various shifts in personnel through the years, featured Hampton, Burbridge, Herring, and Sipe alongside electric mandolinist Matt Mundy, who retired from touring in 1993, and percussionist Count M’Butu, who passed away in 2021.
Related: Expect The Unexpected: The Legend of Col. Bruce Hampton [2015 Interview]
While the group’s last two studio albums, 1994’s In A Perfect World and 2003’s The Calling, were recorded without Hampton during his decade-long retirement from the band in the ’90s and ’00s, Col. Bruce later returned as the driving force of the ARU between 2004 and 2015, when the group mounted a smattering of live performances.
The Aquarium Rescue Unit last performed live as part of a 2015 reunion tour. Col. Bruce Hampton shuffled off the mortal coil in stranger-than-fiction fashion less than two years later at the end of his own 70th birthday concert—as Sipe, Herring, and scores of his other Zambi pupils played along. The band has not made any official appearances or released any new records since Hampton’s death in 2017.
Col. Bruce Hampton & The Aquarium Rescue Unit – “Basically Frightened” (Live)
The surviving band members of the band have gone on to forge storied careers of their own since The Aquarium Rescue Unit’s heyday.
Jeff Sipe has remained active with various projects, logging tours and recording music with everyone from Jeff Coffin to Keller Williams to Leftover Salmon to John McLaughlin and beyond. Jimmy Herring has notched brief stints with The Dead/The Other Ones and the Allman Brothers Band, played extensively with the late Phil Lesh, toured alongside Hampton in The Codetalkers, and launched his own outfit, The 5 of 7, but is now best known as the lead guitarist for Widespread Panic, a gig he has held since 2006.
Oteil Burbridge has, in many ways, become the glue that holds the contemporary jam band scene together. In the late 1990s, he began a tenure as the bassist for the Allman Brothers Band that lasted until the group’s retirement in 2014. In 2001, he linked up with Phish keyboardist Page McConnell and the funky Meters drummer Russell Batiste Jr. to form Vida Blue. In 2010, he helped co-found the Tedeschi Trucks Band alongside ABB bandmate Derek Trucks and his wife, Susan Tedeschi, and contributed to the band’s debut album, Revelator, which took home the 2011 Grammy Award for Best Blues Album. In 2015, he was drafted into the extended Grateful Dead universe as a member of Dead & Company.
Related: Stranger Than Fiction: The Cosmic Curtain Call Of Col. Bruce Hampton
The photo in question was posted publicly by Souvik Dutta, the founder of the record label/media company/production group Abstract Logix, which championed the ARU and its members alongside other exciting experimental artists like John McLaughlin and Zakir Hussain throughout the late 2000s.
In a 2024 All About Jazz interview, Dutta notably credited Project Z, a Col. Bruce-inspired project featuring Herring, Sipe, and bassist Rickey Keller, as the impetus for transforming Abstract Logix into a record label in 2004. He explained, “Jeff Sipe … introduced me to guitarist Jimmy Herring over the phone. Now I’ve been a die-hard Aquarium Rescue Unit fan since I moved to North Carolina in the ’90s and had always loved Herring’s playing with Phil Lesh and Jazz Is Dead. So I went down to an ARU gig in New Orleans to meet up with Jimmy and Jeff, Oteil Burbridge and Bruce Hampton.
“A few weeks later,” he continued, “Jimmy and I met again in Raleigh about the Project Z record. I still laugh when I think about our funny conversation over that lunch. Jimmy was so apologetic about the music. I remember him saying, ‘As they say down in Atlanta, Z Music—it’s not music for everybody. It’s vomit! [laughs]. … But that is exactly what I like—craziness and anarchy. I must have been a last resort for Herring and Sipe, but I bought it because it was right up my alley and frankly, no one had ever offered to sell me a record [laughs].”
Also pictured in the new photo flanking Sipe, Burbridge, and Herring are Widespread Panic guitar tech Joel “Zoel” Bryon (far left), Souvik Dutta (second from left), Abstract Logix director of operations/North Carolina musician Dave George (second from right), and John Keane (far right).
While the post’s caption doesn’t specifically mention the reason for this meeting of talented minds, it certainly seems to hint at a new Aquarium Rescue Unit record in the works. “I am with few [sic] of my very dear friends here in John Keane’s studio in Athens. Maybe you can take a guess why. I am overwhelmed with joy and deep gratitude to Jimmy, Jeff and Oteil. A Full [sic] circle moment for me after two decade [sic] of friendship for them. This one is for the colonel [sic].”
We can’t wait to see what comes of this. Long live Col. Bruce.
This story is developing.
[h/t Evan Warren via HomeTeam.FM Facebook group]
‘ The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties ’
‘ Some details of this article were extracted from the following source liveforlivemusic.com ’
