Max Delaney, Guitarist for Uncle Sammy:

"On The Level" is actually a segment extracted from a version of our song "M.A.G." There are certain songs in our repertoire that are more formatted and song-oriented. There are also certain songs that are platforms for group improvisation and lend themselves better to being launch pads for the group to really take the song somewhere outside of the form. "M.A.G." is definitely one of those songs. Ideally, when we're really listening to each other very well, we improvise the jam section of that tune in such a way that we kind of write the form as we're playing. With "On The Level," we were very happy with the way the music materialized at Wetlands that night, during the recording of this album. It felt very organic and very spontaneous, but it also wasn't just a lot of random babbling and a lot of random notes being played. Instead, it was very much a piece of music, that to me felt like it had form. We were very conscious of form at the same time that we were improvising it. It essentially stays on a one-chord vamp the whole time, which is usually one of the better methods for a group to use for improvisation. By having one central tonal center, everyone can write their own part. By staying in the context of one key, whatever style it is, it gives the group an opportunity to really listen to each other and improvise without technical problems such as key changes and tonalities getting in the way. In this case, the jam turned out to be a one chord vamp, but I feel like the parts that we were each laying down very much felt like they were part of a larger whole. Ideally, when group improvisation is happening, the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. I think that's very much what happened with "On The Level."

The title, "On The Level" comes from a very interesting story. We were lost on a rainy Monday night in Woodstock, NY looking for Nevessa Studios, where we mastered the CD. We had been driving in circles for about 45 minutes and chanced upon a convenience story, which we stopped in to and started asking the guy behind the counter for directions. There was a grizzled older gentleman with a big old white beard standing in line behind me and he started hearing our conversation. He immediately chimed in and asked me why I wanted to go to Nevessa Studios. When I told him that we were in a band and were in Woodstock to master our CD, he asked me if I was "on the level." To which I responded that we surely were even though I wasn't quite sure what he meant. At that point this guy offered to lead us to the studio and we followed him in our car. When we showed up, he actually wound up going inside ahead of us and our first thought was that we just showed up at Chris Andersen's (the engineer) home studio with some shady stranger in the middle of the night. As it turns out, Chris in fact knew him and was incredibly surprised to see him, as it had been a while. As soon as the guy left, Chris explained to us that it was Garth Hudson, keyboard player of The Band. That was our first impression of Woodstock.

That phrase "on the level" seemed to stick with us and it felt like a very appropriate title for this piece of music. Not only because we felt the terminology that Garth used was funny, but also because when the band is playing and really listening to each other very well, we feel like we're all on the level.

Listen to On the Level

Naturally Preserved can be ordered through the band's website at www.unclesammy.com or at the Jambands store