'Around the World With U' is the sophomore release by Ulysses Owens Jr. Produced by Owens for Cellar Music, 'Around the World With U' finds the Grammy Award-winning drummer, producer, and educator together again with his ensemble Generation Y. Following 2024's A New Beat, Owens and Generation y build, and in many ways move beyond their debut, aiming toward their proverbial North Star: The Jazz Messengers, Art Blakey's prodigious and ever-shifting ensemble who set a high bar in committing more than 100 albums - both live and studio productions - to tape. Although Generation y has only just begun to establish it's recording legacy, A New Beat put both the ambition and potential of Owens' ensemble on full display. And in the short time between their freshman and sophomore recordings, members of Gen y ascended to new levels. Around the World with U features Erena Terakubo on Alto Saxophone, Anthony Hervey on Trumpet and Tyler Bullock on piano (both former Juilliard students of Owens'); Yasushi Nakamura on bass, who was a student with Ulysses at Juilliard within the Inaugural first years of the jazz studies program. Lastly Nanami Haruta on trombone joins the quintet on the tunes "Road Life" and "Little Girl Power" who was a product of the Seiko Jazz Camp which was created by Ulysses Owens Jr., Takeshi Ohbayashi, and Tomoki Sassa in 2016 due to their previous relationships through the band New Century Jazz Quintet. 'Around the World with U' finds Owens' band brimming with confidence earned during long stretches of global touring. There's a new and singular synergy that's evident from the album's first notes. "Gen y now has some street credit," Owens says of the band's evident assuredness. Owens says the band was motivated to push their music forward, after two years in which the group released it's debut, toured the globe, and went viral with a cover of Nirvana's alt-rock masterpiece "Heart Shaped Box."