Were super-excited to be speaking today with acclaimed British-American Acid Blues band extraordinaire, . Bees Deluxe; greetings and salutations, gang! Before we dive into the proverbial Q&A mosh-pit, could you each say hi and introduce yourselves to our ever-inquisitive readers?

Hi Raf! Were honored to join you. Four of us are the main members of Bees Deluxe. Carol Band plays keyboards, harmonicas and sings, Paul Giovine plays drums & percussion, Jim Gildea plays the bass guitar and sings, and Conrad Warre plays guitars (acoustic & electric), trumpet and sings. He also plays a kaossilator on his cellphone! Were based in Boston, Massachusetts and tour from Maine to Miami and as far east as Cleveland, Ohio.

Major congratulations on your brand-spankin new -and very incredible – album Hallucinate which officially premiered this November 18! Conrad, starting at the tip-top, what inspired this beautiful new LP?

Thank you! The original songs and tunes for Hallucinate were prompted and inspired by jams & improvisations we would play at soundchecks, and in the van while driving between shows. While we love to play songs onstage by some of our heroes Etta James, Joe Zawinul, Albert Collins, Billie Holiday for example we also love to write and compose, so we built a library of materials we could work on collectively and individually whenever a studio was available in the past eleven months. For instance Paul recorded the drums for Sharkskin Suit in his bedroom at his house in Framingham, and Conrad recorded kaossilator tunes in his kitchen at Jamaica Plain. We would gather occasionally for more formal recording sessions but essentially we, and our friends, who are listed in the credits, would fly in their parts.

Carol, the rightly celebrated Joe Egan did the producing honors on Hallucinate. What was the collaboration like between Bees Deluxe and Joe while in the studio putting the new album together?

Whenever Joe Egan, our producer, was available, and I could get out, I would drive to his house and sit next to him where he had a bank of electronic keyboards and an upright piano, set up and micd & wired straight into the computer. Joe is an excellent piano player and keyboardist in his own right, so he and I would collaborate on parts and harmonies, and the selection of voices and timbres for the keyboard parts. Some crazy sounds would creep in, and some more mellow and typical like Hammond and Wurlitzer sounds pending the song or the tune. I composed and recorded How to Play 96 Tears on my own piano in my living room in Arlington Conrad put some strings on it and its the simplest arrangements of all the albums tracks!

Poogie, in your humble opinion what differentiates Hallucinate from the Distinguished Competition on the 2023 music scene?

Conrad sent me a demo for Nitro including just rhythm guitar and his vocals, and I tracked the drums in sync with his demo in my studio in Pennsylvania. He and I have never actually met! But were friends and collaborators via the internet! Right now Im the owner and manager of Yuji Sound Records in Pittsburg, Pennsylvania.

Allyn, in the wake of the November 18 release of the Hallucinate LP, can fans look forward to catching Bees Deluxe on the touring/performing circuit?

Jim and I take turns playing onstage with Bees Deluxe, as the workload is getting pretty intense, bit of us are in heavy demand as bass players in and around the New England area. And were going to start adding more songs from Hallucinate to our live repertoire and see which go down best in front of an audience should be fun!

Jared, how is Hallucinate similar to some of the past music from Bees Deluxe? How is it different?

I think Sharkskin Suit is the only song where Conrad has ever played and recorded a guitar battle with another guitar player as hes the writer and usually plays all the guitar parts. Im glad its the lead track on the album as I think it sounds great. They made me play a little bass on another song too.

A question for all of you: Who inspires you musically?

The list is endless and constantly changing. Heres whats in the 6 Disc CD player in the tour van: Bendik, Tony! Toni! Tone!, Errol Garner, Michael Burks, Gil Scot Heron and Donny Hathaway.

James, what sort of difficulties presented themselves while attempting to record the new LP between tour dates for Bees Deluxe? Or did it all come off pretty seamlessly?

For me, the album went seamlessly, I recorded my parts at the beginning of the year, and during the following months would drop into the sessions only occasionally to drink coffee, and to see how how things were progressing. By the time the album had been mixed Id forgotton some of the tunes! And there were more tunes that were left on the cutting room floor we may resuscitate later!

Paul, as big fans of Question Mark and The Mysterians, we absolutely LOVED the tune How to Play 96 Tears off of the new album! Need we ask what served as the inspiration behind this little gem?

Well Carol composed, recorded and played this tune, but I know the exact history of its composition. Whenever we toured through New York, on our way south, or on our way back to Boston, we would stay at our friend JR Rosts house in Brooklyn. JR was a dear friend, a musician in his own right, and a professional photographer and he would often accompany us on sections or legs of the tour. And very often, when we would return to his house late at night to crash, he and Carol would sit at the piano and play duets until two or three in the morning and he would often ask Carol to teach him how to play 96 Tears. He died unexpectedly this year so weve dedicated the Hallucinate album to his memory. She wrote this tune for him, and we miss his spirit and his company very badly.

Adam, at the end of the day what do you hope listeners walk away with after giving many-a-spin to the amazing new Bees Deluxe album Hallucinate?

Im the stunt bass player, when Jim is unavailable, they fly me in from Boston – Im exaggerating as its only 3 miles to the studio in Hyde Park, to fix tracks Conrad has messed up! I play with Bees Deluxe as much as I can but I have a steady day-time job teaching music therapy to children in Boston Mass General Hospital, so I cant really tour with the band but I love playing with the band whenever they invite me and I can!

All: Thank you, Raf!