Is it possible to sell out by becoming a jam band? That’s the question unfortunately raised by acid-jazz saxman Topaz McGarrigle and his new quasi-supergroup of roots sidemen, Mudphonic. They make a big deal out of the diversity of their backgrounds—and musical miscegenation is always preferable to monotony—but the result is much less than the sum of its parts. How veterans of Bay Area and NYC jazz as well as Latin rock and Austin blues can come up with a debut that sounds like your average colorless blues-funk bar band is hard to fathom. It’s not that Mudphonic doesn’t noodle, but the foundation is missing. The grooves are thin and flavorless, giving the half-assed chants on top no reason for being.

Eventually, they loosen up. Topaz’s sax (and some Latin flavor) finally surfaces on “Twin Oaks,” a jam that actually makes you feel like you’ve been plumbing the depths of your own mind in the best jam tradition, and “Home” is an extended throwdown that chooses to smolder endlessly rather than burn (shades of vintage Pearl Jam). But there’s too much two-dimensional funk and generic blues on Music for Dorothy.