“Change is exciting, challenging and a constant part of life. It is the process of evolution and growth. We do our best to embrace change in our lives and the music we play.” With these words posted to their Facebook page late in May 2015, Kung Fu announced the departure of their founding keyboardist—and one of their most visible members—and welcomed a new musician into their ranks. Todd Stoops was out. Beau Sasser was in—and the news hit the band’s fan base hard.

Seemingly split into two camps, Kung Fu’s fans either balked at the band’s firing of a musician with the talent and presence of Stoops and the way in which it was carried out—via email—or respectfully wished Stoops the best and expressed their excitement at what was to come for the Connecticut-based funk quintet. As the squabbling played out over the Internet, the guys couldn’t help but notice.

“We see everything,” says saxophonist Rob Somerville, lounging on a greenroom couch at New York’s Brooklyn Bowl. The band is hanging out together backstage a few hours from show time, before the first of two packed, high-energy shows that will help set up the release of their first album without Stoops, Joyride.

“We saw. It wasn’t easy,” adds drummer Adrian Tramontano from the other end of the couch. “It’s like a divorce—everybody thinks they know everything about it. But that’s the way it is in the music business when you have a breakup or a member leaves—everybody likes to think they know best or what they’re talking about, but it’s honestly nobody’s business what really happened. There was a good reason—that’s all it is.”

It’s a mark of the modern music world that many—if not the majority of—bands have most of their interactions with fans through social media, especially in the jam scene in which Kung Fu reside. “The dynamic of Facebook and social media is interesting because if you put out some negativity, it snowballs,” says guitarist Tim Palmieri. “It just amplifies. You start with this negativity, and it just gets out of hand. It’s just like, ‘What scene are we in? Isn’t this the sunshine daydream scene?’ It just allows the trolls out there to really start cutting their teeth and exercising their nastiness behind a computer keyboard. So that’s unfortunate.”

There really wasn’t much time to dwell on outside perceptions, though—less than two weeks after their announcement, Kung Fu played their first show with their new lineup at Disc Jam in Upstate New York State. “It’s not that you block it out,” says Somerville. “It’s just that, you know, you fuckin’ move on. You get back to work and you do it the best you can.”

“All the negative responses are online and in this cyber, fake world,” Tramontano interjects. “Everything at the shows is positive. So, you can hate us on the Internet.”

“We were just getting back to a healthy, happy work environment,” continues Somerville. “Staying committed to that concept of being true to ourselves and just being productive and making music— we’re in the business of making music, not drama. There’s no rewards for drama in music, and that’s the route we’re gonna take.”

Surprisingly, it seems Sasser was untouched by the whole ordeal, deciding instead to put his head down and focus on the music—which was, in reality, all he had time to do, as there was an entire catalog of songs he needed to get under his fingers. “I will say that how the whole situation blew up was a little bit surprising to me,” he says. “I think any of the negativity that was involved didn’t really affect the playing or keeping my head straight. I had my nose to the grindstone as far as the material was concerned. I learned it in a very quick fashion and we went out there and started playing.”

For those who knew or had even just met Sasser, the fact that he dealt with the transition in such a way wasn’t surprising. He is, by all accounts, an even-keeled professional. “You gotta know the type of person Beau is,” say bassist Chris DeAngelis. “He just came in and it was immediately good vibes; everything’s great.”

“That probably would’ve scared the shit out of me,” says Tramontano. “The whole situation didn’t even phase this guy.”

The entire band agrees that the new lineup’s Disc Jam performance was a success. As DeAngelis puts it: “When [Beau] took that first solo, man, I knew it was gonna be OK.” Sasser echoes the sentiment, saying, “I thought it came together pretty darn smoothly, to be honest with you. Even the first couple rehearsals we had— I think we could all tell it was going to be totally fine.”

The day after that festival outing, the group jumped onto a plane and flew out to Colorado to play two more sets in Denver, before Sasser got on a flight right back to Disc Jam to play a Sunday set with his other outfit, Beau Sasser’s Escape Plan. And that was just the beginning of a tight schedule for the keyboardist.

“That was my whole summer because I already had a schedule booked when these guys hit me up,” says Sasser. “I had to fit a square peg into this circle hole all summer. That was the biggest growing pain, keeping the energy up and finding time to work on the tunes—because they are certainly challenging. Last summer was a bear.”

Sasser made it through, however, and has now been with Kung Fu for over a year. The new quintet has an album under their belt, Joyride, which dropped this past March and has Kung Fu back in the business of making their own brand of punchy funk fusion. Far from slowing down to accommodate a new member, the group became even more productive and now see themselves as a better version of Kung Fu— happier, healthier and more together than ever.

“The biggest change is just the amount of material that we’ve come up with,” says Somerville. “You know, for a year prior to Beau joining the band, I don’t think we wrote a single tune. Now, here we are a year later with a new album. The personalities in the band just jive—we’re getting along; we’re having fun. We’re working. I think the creative process comes back to life when everybody’s in it to win it.”

The newfound energy wasn’t limited to new material, either. Two songs on Joyride, opening track “Daddy D” and “Speed Bump of Your Love,” had been bouncing around in Somerville’s head for years before this renewed state of creativity in the band spurred their completion. The lyrics for “Daddy D” (which contains a throwback cameo from original Kung Fu bassist David Livolsi on background vocals) came out of an experience involving him, DeAngelis and a broken-down cargo van—just one example among many of the band’s strengthened bond.

“We all personally moved on immediately and just started practicing, writing new ideas and new songs,” says DeAngelis. “It was just bam, bam, bam on the road, and we’re brothers already.”

The camaraderie between the band members is palpable in the greenroom, and while they recognize the importance of what came before, they are most visibly excited to talk about the present and the bright future of the group. “Music should be a joyful process,” says Palmieri. “Granted, there is some merit to friendly competition or that kind of vibe—even tension can breed some good art—but I think, long-term, it’s not healthy. It should still be coming from a joyful place, and that’s where it’s coming from now.”

“Having a healthy relationship manifests itself in so many ways,” say Somerville. “For me, at the age I’m at, I don’t have time for anything else. It’s refreshing, to say the least, to be able to be with a group of guys that respect each other in life and on the road— but, most particularly, on the stage. There’s a great amount of listening going on onstage that had never really occurred before in this band—and very few bands that I’ve ever been in. The amount of listening to each other and caring about what the other musicians are playing is paramount to me. That’s really shown itself in our live performances, as well as the record. I can’t emphasize how proud I am of everybody getting through the past year enough, but also the way that everybody is listening musically— it’s just top-tier stuff right now, for me.”

In many ways, Kung Fu is a second marriage; all of the original members have been staples of the Northeast jamband circuit since the late ‘90s. Palmieri and Tramontano first made their marks as members of the Jammy-winning act The Breakfast; founding saxophonist Kris Jensen had backed Allman Brothers Band luminaries Dickey Betts and Jaimoe; and Livolsi, whom Chris DeAngelis replaced, was a veteran of Jazz Is Dead and John Scofield’s various projects. Shortly after Kung Fu formed, Jensen left the group, and Somerville, a longtime member of fellow Connecticut funk heroes Deep Banana Blackout, joined Kung Fu and solidified the lineup.

Kung Fu were more than the sum of their parts from the start, representing a true band with an individual identity. Four years after their formation, the members of Kung Fu feel like they’re only just sinking their teeth into the jamming and improvisational possibilities of the band. They credit much of that to the addition of Sasser, whose résumé includes Boston jamband Uncle Sammy, the funky Alan Evans Trio and the Zappa tribute project Z3, which also counts Palmieri as a member. “He brings a wealth of funk and jazz history to the table, which we appreciate,” says Palmieri. “It’s more open now. We can leave the script and enter some new areas and then come back to the script, whereas we were a little more calculated before. Even though it’s still tight-knit—we’re not going on 20-minute jams here—within our structure, there’s more freedom.”

That structure, it turns out, allows for a wide range of genres that Kung Fu tap into from song to song. Besides their usual wheelhouse of fusion and progressive funk, Joyride takes the band’s sound everywhere from the poppy, driving chorus of the title track to the murky jazz depths of the middle interlude of “Vroom.” And the varying types of songs translate onstage in the dizzying and engaging live shows on which Kung Fu have based their career.

“It’s funny—sometimes I’m sitting up there and thinking how the audience goes through this journey during the show,” says Sasser. “The Earth, Wind & Fire type of funk, and then the more fusion-type stuff, like Mahavishnu Orchestra or a Return to Forever thing. And then, we do ‘Samurai’ sometimes toward the end of the show, and that’s like a big EDM-type jam.”

“And then we play the blues!” adds Somerville.

“It’s a hell of a diverse show when all is said and done,” Sasser continues. “I think we hit all the points, and adding more of a jamming aspect into it has been fun for me—something that I haven’t done in years, and something I grew up listening to and enjoying.”

Tramontano—who, just minutes before, showed his own talent range by jamming on Sasser’s organ when the keyboardist was running late to soundcheck—says that Kung Fu’s shows are more unique now, differing from night to night, which not only makes it easier for fans to keep coming back for more, but also contributes to a widening fan base. “It means you get a diverse crowd, from teens to senior citizens—I’m serious,” says Somerville. “You see people of all ages. When you’re at a show, we’re all together.”

In fact, Kung Fu can summarize their diverse crowd through two recent experiences: First, during their recent trip to Florida’s Wanee Festival, the band experienced probably their biggest audience thus far, and one that Tramontano says was a bit older than what they usually draw. “Like an Allman Brothers/Grateful Dead crowd— not used to seeing this band,” he says. “Which was totally different, but it was awesome.”

Right after returning to the Northeast from Wanee, Kung Fu hosted a Bernie Sanders benefit in Brooklyn with Phish drummer and avid Sanders supporter Jon Fishman and Allman Brothers/Dead & Company bassist Oteil Burbridge, among others. It was a 180- degree about-face in terms of crowd demographic, but Kung Fu don’t put age restrictions on who can enjoy their music.

“You can see a 75-year-old guy with a Frank Zappa T-shirt and an 18-year-old dude with a Snarky Puppy T-shirt, both standing next to each other in the front of the show,” says Sasser.

“That’s a good feeling,” adds Somerville. “We’re very lucky to be able to appeal to that diverse of a crowd.” At 46, having seven years on the next oldest member of the band, the saxophonist appreciates the range in their fans’ ages, but he’s also the first to say that age is just a number—and none of these guys are planning on slowing down this joyride anytime soon. As Somerville sings in the chorus of “Speed Bump of Your Love,” “I’m gettin’ old/ But not over the hill.”

“Here I am—here we are— still doin’ it, and never even questioning what I’ve spent my lifetime doing,” says Somerville. “I still feel like a kid. I still feel like I can kick some 23 year old’s ass on the road.”

And there’s no question as to where he derives that sprightly disposition from. “The energy comes from us playing together,” he continues. “Whether we’re playing in front of a crowd or whether we’re playing in the studio, I think the energy is there no matter where we are—as long as we’re playing together. It’s always progressive, always forward. I like that we haven’t taken a minute to just sit back and enjoy. We’re constantly thinking ahead, and that’s a good place to be.”