Trumpeter Will Miller has been a fixture of Chicago's music scene for years, appearing on key 2010s releases from artists like Chance The Rapper, Whitney, and Twin Peaks and branching out beyond the Windy City for work with heavy hitters like SZA and Mavis Staples. And for many years now, he's been leading Resavoir, an oft-morphing Chicago jazz ensemble that used to record for the city's esteemed International Anthem label.
In March, Resavoir released the sparse and floaty "sleepytime record" Themes For Dreams, a truly gorgeous collection of music. Today Miller is already back with news of another new LP and a stream of its lead single. Despite its title, Resavoir's second album of 2026, Above The Clouds, finds the project still operating in an ephemeral sonic space, albeit with a bit more rhythmic thrust than we heard on Themes For Dreams.
Above The Clouds matches Miller with longtime collaborators Lane Beckstrom (bass) and Jeremy Cunningham (drums) plus new addition Kenneth Leftridge Jr. (woodwinds). The musicians mostly traded out their usual tools of the trade in favor of electronic instruments; Miller, for instance, put down his trumpet and picked up a Steiner Crumar EVI, an "electronic wind analog synthesizer" from the '70s.
On lead single "4th Cloud," which features guitarist Gregory Uhlmann (SML), we get to hear the soothing yet exploratory results. Listen below, where you can also hear Themes For Dreams in full.
TRACKLIST:
01 "Cirrus"
02 "Altostratus"
03 "Stratosphere"
04 "Terrarium"
05 "Earth From Above"
06 "In Motion" (Feat. Knox Fortune)
07 "Cumulonimbus"
08 "Cirrostratus"
09 "Stratus"
10 "Caught Up In A Cloud"
11 "Fog"
12 "4th Cloud" (Feat. Gregory Uhlmann)
13 "Above The Clouds"
Above The Clouds is out 10/9 on L'Univers. Pre-order it here.
