If we learn from the trials and tribulations of hardship more so than from moments of joy, then the founding members of Blues Traveler should be inducted into Mensa. After enduring a motorcycle crash that almost took the life of front-man John Popper, followed by acute health issues that eventually lead to angioplasty, coupled with numerous major industry struggles, and the tragic drug overdose of bassist Bobby Sheehan, the band was left in a state of disarray, and were inevitably brought to a fork in the road. A junction where one path teased at what could have been, and the other road plowed straight to reinvention.
Following a rather uncomfortable and equally unproductive period, which ironically spurned the aptly titled Bridge, Blues Traveler regrouped, rebuilt, and with the permanent additions of family member Tad Kinchla on bass and the stylistic change created by keyboard player Ben Wilson, the band is now forging ahead with merit. With the newly released Truth Be Told, Traveler seems revitalized, bringing back the authentic songwriting and unique musicianship they were conceived on, back to the forefront, while still maintaining their long, storied groundbreaking, improvisational spirit well within sight.
While most high schools always boast of a graduating class that included some student who advanced onto greatness, Princeton High School in Princeton, New Jersey practically has it’s own Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. When a chubby, yet ambitious John Popper attended the school in the early 1980s, he was not only able to form the early stages of Blues Traveler with schoolmate guitarist Chan Kinchla, but also meet his future drummer Brendan Hill and future best friend and bassist Bobby Sheehan. Along with fellow classmates Trey Anastasio (went onto form Phish), Tom Osander (went onto form God Street Wine), and Chris Gross (who went onto form the Spin Doctors, but not before changing his stage name to Barron) Popper had quite a few decent musicians to jam with after school. Proclaiming there was something in the water at Princeton was a bold understatement. Once senior year swung around, and the band name was solidified, like any young aspiring rock band, Blues Traveler set out to record a demo tape. Still only teenagers, but with an artistic vision beyond their years, they were able to capitalize on their naivety, penning simple blues tunes that would eventually become standards on classic rock radio stations almost twenty years later with such fan favorites as, “Sweet Talking Hippie” and “Gina.”
After graduation, the band moved to New York City and quickly found a home in the now defunct, though still revered, Wetlands Preserve. Playing many hot nights, both on stage and off with brother band, The Spin Doctors, more than sweaty college kids took notice. Soon, with the help of Bill Graham, Blues Traveler was signed with A&M; Records shortly before New Years 1989, and their self-titled debut album was released the following year. Although thirteen years have passed, many still consider Blues Traveler both a defining point in the career of the band and in a developing genre of rock, rooted in epic live performances and grass-root values.
Blues Traveler, which includes the radio-hit “But Anyway,” as well as signature Popper ballads “Crystal Flame” and “Alone” among others, set the recording bar for the yet entitled jamband movement. Not only that, but the record served as a model to be followed for crafting pop with improvisational rock in the sterile studio, a successful equation still an achievement mystery to the band themselves. “I would say that the largest strength that our debut album had was the body of songs” guesses Popper. “Because you have to bear in mind that, that was in 1990, and we started being a band in late ‘86 (officially in ‘87), and there were a little more than three and a half years worth of songs that we had to choose from. I think it’s probably the strongest bank of songs going into an album that we ever have had” he admits, before adding, “so if you look at it on that, it should be the strongest album body of work wise. But of course, there are other factors as you get older, like maturity, and who knows, you might write something better down the road.”
And in many instances, they have written better songs since those formative years, and gotten more tech-savvy, but nevertheless, the magic present in the innocent days of the late ‘80s was forever captured in the first record. “In my mind, when I hear that album, the naivety that I can really detect is our poor knowledge of amps. I think my harmonica was playing through like a Peavey studio pro, you know, it was before the realization I had about stacks” he explains. And of course, innocence can be categorized in more ways than just age, experience and songwriting, but also in the simple unknown of what lies ahead as Popper is quick to add. “I would also say naivety is evident in albums that we’re still doing. I hope there is a sense of innocence that doesn’t die no matter how cynical or bitter we get…” humorously concluding, “ahh, knock wood.”
In the summer of 1992, that free spirit led Popper and company into their next endeavor, the formation of their own touring festival, the H.O.R.D.E.. Based on the Lollapalooza model, and with some of his old school buddies now heavily touring with their own bands, Blues Traveler put together the best of the jam pioneers including; Princeton alum Spin Doctors, as well as Bela Fleck & the Flecktones, Phish, Widespread Panic and the Aquarium Rescue Unit. And since the genre was still yet to be officially titled, Popper named the traveling group of talented misfits as Horizons of Rock Developing Everywhere. Little did anyone know how true that generalization would ultimately become. Within a few years, the six relatively unknown rock bands would come to create a blossoming genre, with serious talent and market potential. Although he didn’t see it at the time, the enthusiastic creator is not the least bit surprised of the genre’s rise. Reflecting back on the tour’s rookie year, he explains, “the numbers enabled us to play outdoor sheds, that was simply the math. If we could get our audience and Phish’s audience together, and double them, we were able to play a larger hall, which in the summer meant you could play sheds. We were increasingly aware as that process wore on that we could have a scene, and we certainly had lots of dreams, but I’m not sure if you can ever look back at something like that and know what you were thinking. In a sense, I suppose that I am not surprised that all of the bands involved with H.O.R.D.E did what they did. We were lucky enough to deal with a lot of talented people, but at the same time, you never can tell where someone creative is going to take their career. Because part of it isn’t up to them, and the part that is, expresses it’s self in new ways.” He humbly adds, “I’m very psyched about what has happened, I’ll tell you that much, and I feel really lucky to have been there for a lot of it.” Unfortunately, as fall drew, the black cat synonymous with Blues Traveler was about to cross their path for the first time.
On October 20th, 1992, while riding his motorcycle to the recording studio in New Orleans to finish up the recording of “Manhattan Bridge”, during the Save His Soul sessions, Popper crashed into a station wagon at 70mph, sending him to the hospital where he had his limbs reconstructed. Though the album would still be released shortly there after, and the band would continue with a scaled down touring schedule, the injured singer spent the next year and a half, confined to a wheelchair. When friend David Letterman had Traveler on the Late Show in the winter of ‘94, Popper stood for “Love and Greed,” to which the host commented, “It’s good to see you standing again, John!” As the singer healed, and things got back to a somewhat normal state, they released Four, skyrocketing into manstream rock with the hit “Run Around,” still the longest-charting single ever. With a smash hit like that comes a media frenzy, and come it did. Riding a wave of success, and a follow-up album heavy on the blues in Blues Traveler, Straight On Till Morning saw the band in cruise-control, just doing what they do best, though without the innovative edge heard on previous albums. Then all hell broke lose.
The final year of the millennium was to be celebratory and reflective, with just a handful of shows, a Popper solo album and follow-up tour, but with his rather notorious obesity causing a great deal of unnecessary stress on Popper’s heart, he underwent an angioplasty – an invasive operational procedure performed to reduce or eliminate blockages in coronary arteries. As if recovering from a major surgery wasn’t enough to endure, just a month later, Blues Traveler and the music world at large were shocked with the news of bass player Bobby Sheehan’s overdose. After a much-needed grievance period, the band got themselves up and on their feet, and as he had always done, Popper put his heart in his words and began writing lyrics again. While most lyricists hide behind obscure metaphors, Popper puts it right out there for everyone to see. Not always an easy thing to do, unless that’s all you know. Always poignant, he explains “in the song “Believe Me,” off [Save His Soul], I say the line “I could conquer with my state of denial.” I really think that is how I am able to “put myself out there” as you put it. I really just don’t believe that I am until you point it out, and suddenly I start to feel very self-conscious, and I start to ask myself, ‘have I done the right thing?’
But at this point, it’s far to late to do anything about it, so I might as well play the hand I’m dealt, and continue to put myself out there. He elaborates on the choice of phrase adding, “out there, has always been an interesting term for me, because I’m not sure what it means. I write songs, generally for medicinal reasons to sum up something that I’ve been going through, and in the resolution of the song at least I feel a sense of closure. But it does occur to me, in retrospect, that a lot of the songs I write are very intimate concessions, it just seems to me that there’s a sanitizing aspect, or distancing aspect, or some aspect that enables me to continue doing it. And I suppose by the end of the day you just have to call it denial.”
Aside from a VH1 special, no one expected anything from the band for a while, and when they released Bridge, it’s only redeeming quality was that it eventually lived up to it’s name. With the kinks worked out, Chan’s brother Tad filling in for Bobby’s spot, and the addition of a keyboard player, Ben Wilson, they reformed once again, and the newly released Truth be Told, tells the story of a progressive band with the 80s infantile vigor once again. When fans first heard that a keyboard player would join a band endearingly driven by Popper’s harmonica solos and Chan’s piercing guitar work, tentativeness was rampant. That was until “Sweet and Broken” was written. Not only is “Sweet and Broken” beautiful, and quintessential Blues Traveler, but a great example of the strengths both Ben and Tad have brought to the band. The outro, with Popper singing over the keys is such a delicate close to a very powerful song, a perfect example of not only the reassurance that it would work, but the awe of possibilities it would create, and a now slimmed down and healthy Popper agrees. “The outro in “Sweet and Broken” is an example of what a keyboard can do to a band, and something we have dreamt of for at least a decade.” he boasts. “The arranging styles that Ben Wilson brings just by the inherence of his instrument has quadrupled the bands potential, and already doubled what we’re putting out based on harmonies and arrangements” and eagerly adds, “I’m very excited where he and Tad are at this point.”
So now, with all the band has been through over the past twenty years or so, Truth Be Told seems to display a strong comfort level. Perhaps the past few years have been sort of forced, and now they’ve all come full circle, and are finally looking forward as a band rather than looking back. To which Popper responds, “I think its always important for a musician, or any artist to be trying to look forward, but I have to admit it gets easier to look forward as I grow older than to look back, simply because there is so much to look back at the older you get. I think there was an analogy, it’s an old story, that Robert Duvall used in the movie Colors, about the calf and the bull…there’s something about being able to walk down and ‘fuck em all,’ as he put it in the movie, that really does address the comfort level were dealing with. And I think that’s just through experience. You learn to get good at your job, and you start to feel excited, but it is very exciting now to look ahead, and I’m sure that has a lot to do with the record, but I feel simply closer to what is ahead, because the more I look back the farther it seems.”
I’m hoping we all have a lot more ahead…
