Yes. Blues Traveler is still around. Long ago frontman John Popper graduated from the more-is-more school of blues-rock jamming, his dissertation a seven-minute harmonica solo tucked into a 23-minute jam about a sweet-talking hippie. Since 1990 he's led the band in diligent touring and understatement-free recordings, including an album of covers of their own songs and this year's "North Hollywood Shootout."
Lyrically, Popper's always swung for the fences, reaching for
profundity in nearly every line. Sometimes he comes pretty close.
Honestly, I owe these guys for making my 9th-grade year infinitely more
tolerable. Their brilliant "Travelers and Thieves" gave my
fourteen-year-old self scads of lines to mull over during those crappy
bus rides, back when the world still had a place for a good harmonica
solo.
-- Jonathan Hiskes