"I have my moments," John Popper declares, and many of them -- as harmonica player, singer, and lyricist -- are here, on an album that finds Blues Traveler stretching out much as they do on-stage. Popper is a man with a lot on his mind, but when he reaches "The Best Part," his verbosity approaches a Walt Whitman-like exuberance, and guitarist Chan Kinchla is right with him, contributing sweet fills here, Pete Townshend-style strumming there. And as for the rhythm work of bassist Bobby Sheehan and drummer Brendan Hill, as Popper says, "It's all in the groove.""I have my moments," John Popper declares, and many of them -- as harmonica player, singer, and lyricist -- are here, on an album that finds Blues Traveler stretching out much as they do on-stage. Popper is a man with a lot on his mind, but when he reaches "The Best Part," his verbosity approaches a Walt Whitman-like exuberance, and guitarist Chan Kinchla is right with him, contributing sweet fills here, Pete Townshend-style strumming there. And as for the rhythm work of bassist Bobby Sheehan and drummer Brendan Hill, as Popper says, "It's all in the groove."false2025-11-08 09:09:43Travelers & Thieves19911991-09-031991-09-0362Rock112959212175429dd0cad-c0cc-4af1-8da0-e635d0b123d56b28ecf0-94e6-48bb-aa2a-5ede325b675bf8271018-faee-3a16-938b-ad77bd17eee0/media/data/media4/Music/Blues Traveler/Travelers & Thieves/folder.jpg/media/data/media4/Music/Blues Traveler/Travelers & Thieves/backdrop1.jpgBlues TravelerBlues TravelerBlues Traveler is an American rock band that formed in Princeton, New Jersey in 1987. They are known for their extensive use of segues in live performances, and were considered a key part of the re-emerging jam band scene of the 1990s, spearheading the H.O.R.D.E. touring music festival.
Currently, the group comprises singer and harmonica player John Popper, guitarist Chan Kinchla, drummer Brendan Hill, bassist Tad Kinchla, and keyboardist Ben Wilson. Tad Kinchla and Ben Wilson joined the band following the death of original bassist Bobby Sheehan in 1999.
While Blues Traveler is best known among fans for their improvisational live shows, the general public is most familiar with the group from their Top 40 singles "Run-Around", "Hook", and "But Anyway". They gained mainstream popularity after their fourth studio album, four, which was released in 1994 and became a sleeper hit almost a year later. Sheehan's death and Popper's struggle with obesity put a damper on the group's success, and A&M dropped the band in 2002. In the years following, the band has bounced around through a succession of independent labels and record producers, and gotten increasingly experimental with their recorded output.
Blues Traveler's latest album, Traveler's Blues, was released in July 2021, and has been nominated by The Recording Academy for Best Traditional Blues album at the 2022 Grammy Awards.