Chandler Travis

Chandler Travis has had a long and checkered career in the world of show biz, beginning in the seventies when he and Steve Shook joined up as Travis Shook and the Club Wow. Besides achieving much popularity on the east coast, the duo brought their peculiar blend of comedy and music all over the U.S. and to the nationwide television audience on such programs as the Tonight Show, the Midnight Special, and Dick Cavett. Along the way, they released an album and appeared on stage with everyone from Bonnie Raitt to Bruce Springsteen to especially good pals NRBQ and George Carlin (with whom they toured for many years) to Elvis Costello to– well, you get the idea.

In 1980, Travis was a founding member of the Incredible Casuals, who released four albums (not counting 2007’s “Best Of” collection, “World Championship Songs”), toured consistently all over the world, and are still at it, much to the delight of a small but rabid international following.

In 1988, Chandler began moonlighting as a solo performer, presenting the unlikely mixture of oddball humor and incisive songwriting that continue to be his trademark and appearing with such diverse acts as 10,000 Maniacs, Mose Allison, Roger McGuinn, and (deja vu perhaps?) George Carlin. Upon the arrival of the critically lauded “writer-songsinger” CD, the solo career kicked into high gear with two successful west coast tours and a European jaunt in 1993; “Ivan in Paris” followed in 1998, as did “After She Left” in 2009.

Late in 1996 (much to his own surprise and delight), Travis found himself fronting a nine-piece band, the modestly monikered Chandler Travis Philharmonic -probably the world’s only alternative dixieland / omnipop band. Between three and eighteen CDs followed (depending on whether you count the CTP’s fifteen contributions in 2000 to the improbable and ground-breaking RadioBall series), plus years of extensive touring. The CTP’s latest effort, “The Chandler Travis Philharmonic Blows”, arrived in 2010.

Next up was the formation of two interesting new bands, the Catbirds and the Chandler Travis Three-O, both of whom issued widely divergent debut CDs (very loud and electric, and very soft and acoustic, respectively) in 2013. The crowd went wild!

Most recently, in an attempt to not only sum up the story so far with some of the best tracks from the last three decades, but to advance it with 8 new ones; Chandler released “Bocce & Bourbon: the Comfortable Songs of Chandler Travis & David Greenberger”, which includes work from all his current projects, all in the service of work by his longtime favorite lyricist, David Greenberger, thus setting the world aflame yet again (goes without saying doesn’t it? Or, at least might have…).