UNDEFINABLE (2026)
Scheduled for release in 2026, the latest album from Mungo Jerry is Undefinable. Mick O’Hanlon, just like he did for the previous CD, Somelight, has already reviewed each track for us at the website and also for the forthcoming book reviewing each and every Mungo Jerry track to date.
Tracks: Five Hundred Miles/Stand Up/I Walk Alone/Made With Love/Always Time For Coffee/Born To Sing The Blues/We Were Born/That Is Why (I’m So In Love With You)/Road Trip/Keep Rockin’.
REVIEW #1
Right, let’s be clear about this:
“Undefinable”, according to the Oxford English Dictionary, means “something that cannot be defined by anyone” whereas “Indefinable” refers to anything that cannot be precisely defined or put into words.
Have we all got that then? I suppose it shows the folly of trying to over-define something.
Ray Dorset and Mungo Jerry are two inseparable sides of the same gold coin, a fact that two band members discovered the hard way, when they tried to sack Ray in 1972. The management were not having it so, the duo left and Ray continued as Mungo Jerry, a persona that perfectly matched the public’s perception of the man and his music.
When Ray Dorset’s Mungo Jerry exploded onto the scene during the summer of 1970, the music press hammered out reviews and critiques to categorise the sound and the esprit of the newcomers. The music press took themselves very seriously back then. Journalists crusaded passionately to advise discerning music fans whether a new act was a singles band or an album band. After all, one very ‘Important’(what?) supergroup had told NME that the reason they never released singles was because they didn’t want their music being played by the wrong sort of people.
Try as they might, the music press could never pigeon-hole Ray Dorset. Some of them underestimated Mungo Jerry from the beginning, despite nearly sixty subsequent years of successful touring, recording and releasing hit singles and at least 25 albums. Maybe they just tried too hard to define Mungo Jerry.
Categorising the breadth and depth of Ray’s music can be like trying to herd cats. Mungo Jerry recordings embrace every genre and style from blues, bluegrass and the jugband era of Americana, through the Rock’n’roll and Rockabilly beloved of his teen years to psychedelia, discotheque and well beyond. His new Undefinable album provides a rich slice of delights for Mungo fans to savour. Ray has said that most listeners are not prejudiced by ephemeral genres or styles. He says that the listener simply likes or dislikes a song, without any other agenda.
His judgement is honed by six decades of live performances before millions, all around the world. His innate communion with an audience and his understanding of what they want at any time is the life force behind any Mungo Jerry gig. In this respect, Undefinable is a triumph. The ten tracks encompass a mix of Mungo magic with laid back road trip standards and some gems that would have been Top Ten hits when vinyl was king. Ah, those days of keeping ten-bob aside to buy the latest Mungo Jerry single. Well, Undefinable has more than a few quid’s worth of hits to keep any listener happy.
Five Hundred Miles is another in the style of classic American road blues. It has some witty MJ lyrics that recall My Friend from the first MJ album.
Stand Up brings us back to the rolling, road trip theme. It’s a hippy protest song about being true to your beliefs. Strong, echoey vocals driven by sleek sax and crisp percussion reinforce this stomper.
I Walk Alone is an atmospheric nightcrawler, reminiscent of Ray’s Covid-era albums. It’s one of his story songs, a little like Gone to Malayia, from the Polydor years.
Made with Love is harmonious, catchy and bouncy. A definite single from this album. The organ and guitar provide a vibe where Boot Power’s, My Girl and Me might meet Say Goodnight from MJ’s Greatest hits (1973).
Always Time For Coffee is the stand-out, Mungo connoisseur’s real-deal, smash hit from this album. This is the one that makes you jump around in a proper MJ jam.
We’re back in that VW van on the road trip with Born To Sing The Blues. Touches of Solomon Burke-like skat singing as Ray explores some radical vocal styles.
We Were Born is an anthem that reminds us of Follow Me Down, from Electronically Tested (1971). It also conjures up memories of Play for you my Drum, a MJ Euro hit from the 1980s.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>That Is Why (I’m So In Love With You) is the obvious third (or maybe fourth?) must-be-a-hit song from this album. Fans love this, as was proven in its climb on the Heritage Chart Show.
Road Trip provides the musical backdrop to the whole album. Imagine you are with a group of hippies in a beat-up old VW van, trundling along Route 66 and you’ll get the picture. Ray’s laid-back drawl evokes Ken Kesey’s Merry Pranksters era, without the need for other stimulants: “We won’t need no acid test”.
Keep On Rockin’ wraps up the album and reminds you it’s time to play it again. KOR is a nod to Ray’s encore sign-off for half a century. His driving vocals provide the engine behind this song, this album and every Mungo Jerry release since 1970.
This album is led by Ray’s throaty and sometimes experimental vocalising. The warm and sophisticated sax provides a harmonious backdrop throughout. Slick drumming maintains the tempo and the keyboards complement the guitar riffs to gel Undefinable’s ten tracks into an album that works.
There has been some talk that this may be Ray’s last album, bringing down the curtain on an astonishing career. I prefer to wait and see. While any musical colossus could proudly hang up the guitar and point contentedly to a back catalogue of global hits, I sense that Ray Dorset’s personal muse will not let him rest on his laurels for very long. I doubt that the entity that is Mungo Jerry will let him.
Mick O’Hanlon.
REVIEW #2
Soul lasts forever. And soul emanates from every track on the latest album from Mungo Jerry.
Almost six decades have slipped by since the planet was charmed by Ray Dorset’s In the Summertime followed by other massive hits, during a period referred to as Mungo Mania by Melody Maker.
Since then, Ray’s Mungo Jerry band have topped charts worldwide with hits penned by Ray.
His line-ups over the years have hosted many musicians – each one fitted to a certain style that suited his music – as his muse moved him at any particular time.
Ray Dorset and Mungo Jerry are two inseparable sides of the same gold coin. A fact that two band members discovered the hard way, when they tried to sack Ray in 1972.
The management were not having it so, the duo left and Ray continued as Mungo Jerry, a persona that perfectly matched the public’s perception of the man and his music.
Mungo Jerry has circumnavigated the world many times, playing to vast crowds at festivals or in some cases, in smaller, intimate halls. In either setting, the result is always the same; Ray Dorset’s energy and his communion with his audience ensures everyone is in on the vibe.
So how do you pigeonhole this album that challenges definition, even in its title? There’s no need. You won’t find the ubiquitous In the Summertime or any other of the hits here that made Mungo Jerry a reference point for the 1970s.
Each of those hits is different from the others, a mark of Ray’s versatility. What they have in common is soul, the living, driving force at the core of Ray’s unique talent.
His talent was nurtured by some of the greatest musical influences that hissed and crackled from 1950’s radio, shaping the pre-teen Ray Dorset.
During his teen years, he unravelled the tantalising blues thread that led him to the earlier Americana dustbowl blues, blue grass and rural blues.
By this time, Ray was leading his band through a series of names and styles, performing on stages around Swinging Sixties London when that city was the clearing house for some of the biggest bands of the last sixty years. He has done it all.
So what does Undefinable now present? The gatefold cover brings us back to happy vinyl days, when you could admire the design, read the lyrics, and really possess the record while you listened to the music.
The cover also has a moving tribute to the late Darren Jones, recording engineer and bassist with Mungo Jerry, who passed away in 2025.
Ten songs express the range of Ray’s music, each one different but full of soul. It has been a long time since Top of The Pops once showcased how the public were buying vinyl.
However, Talking Pictures TV’s Heritage Chart Show now fills that gap where music fans around the world vote for their favourite release each week.
Mungo Jerry has been regularly peppering those charts in recent times and several of those hits appear on this album. This record is perfect company for a long car journey. The last lyrics on this album are from Keep on Rockin’
You may not hear me on the radio
But I’ll be on the go because I’ll keep on rockin!
Well, you may very well hear Ray on the radio (and TV) in the very near future because he has just released Pick It Up, an anti-littering song as part of a nationwide anti littering campaign.
Keep on Rockin’ Mungo Jerry!
Mick O’Hanlon
