Q&A with Blues Traveler's Brendan Hill

By Joshua Maloni

GM/Managing Editor

Platinum-selling New Jersey rock, soul and, yes, blues mainstays, Blues Traveler will co-headline an Aug. 16 outdoor concert at Artpark in Lewiston. They’re joining up with anthemic Colorado rock ’n’ roll quartet Big Head Todd and the Monsters for a fun double-bill.

Tickets are available online at www.artpark.net and at the Artpark box office, 450 S. Fourth St., Lewiston.

Drummer Brendan Hill shared more in the edited Q&A that follows the band bio.

^{Blues Traveler photo by Graham Fielder}

Q: Tell me how your summer has been going and what kind of response you're getting from fans thus far.

Brendan Hill: Yeah, great. We started this summer run with our annual show at Red Rocks in Colorado; and we've done that show now 30 years in a row, minus COVID. It's sort of our annual event. It was so great just to kind of reconnect with our fans. It’s like a yearly pilgrimage that our fans make. And so that was awesome. That started our tour July 4.

And then from there we went on to do, I think six or seven dates with a band called JJ Grey & Mofro, which was awesome, and we had a great time with them. And obviously they're very complimentary, musicwise, but different enough so that when our when our fans combined, you know, they get to see a little bit of something different maybe. So, it wasn't just the same thing for the whole show.

And then, going forward on that, we did I think it was three shows with Umphrey’s McGee, and that was in the kind of California down the West Coast. And we did that; I think that ended about two weeks ago. And then we've had one or two shows in between then, and now, today, we start. We're here in Arkansas, with our good friends Big Head Todd and the Monsters, and I believe that's the show that you're going to have up there, where you are. And so, we love these guys; we've played with them since we both were bands in the ’90s. And every once a while, we get to reconverge and do a tour together, and we did one last summer, which was really fun. They’re great players and we're just good friends – and that's what makes playing music so rewarding, is when you get to go out and play music together with your friends. And it's just sit-ins, and it's good vibes, and fans see that and respond to that.

Q: It seems like more shows nowadays have these double-bill, triple-bills like what we're going to have with you guys and Big Head Todd and The Monsters. What do you suppose the appeal of a show like that is, as opposed to just having one headliner?

Brendan Hill: Yeah, I mean, obviously we do our own headline shows all year long. But I think in the summer, with these kind of outdoor venues, it's just we want to have people who’ve got so much to choose from over the summer – there’s so many bands that are touring – and so, if you can kind of combine it, it means that we don't have to go through individually. They get to see kind of a package, which means it's a longer evening or a good-length evening of two bands that you really like, and you get to kind of see it and hang out with your friends.

And then also, you may be Blues Traveler-curious or Big Head Todd-curious, and you’ve heard about them, but you've never seen them before. It's just a great way to kind of combine, and sort of put all our fans and friends, everybody, kind of connect everybody again.

So, I think it's probably we can play maybe slightly bigger places when we combine, because there's an additional draw of their fans, plus our fans. But I really think it's mostly the connection of people wanting to come out and see a show out, and to have picnic blankets or like these outdoor venues allow people to kind of tailgate and that kind of stuff. So, it becomes more of an event rather than just a concert.

Q: I appreciate you telling me a little bit about the dynamics between the team-up, and the show, and what people can expect. Tell me more about the live show, in terms of song selection and the approach to it. I'm sure there's quite a process trying to figure out what songs you're going to play. When you've had a distinguished career like you’ve had, how is it trying to make that fit into an appropriate time slot each night?

Brendan Hill: Yeah, that's a great question. You know, we've been doing this for (a long time). Our first album came out in ’90-91. And so, we've got 16-17 records. But, you know, the songs that people want to hear, especially in a outdoor kind of amphitheater, with crowds that are maybe Big Head Todd fans, or maybe have not seen us before, we kind of have to play the songs that we’re well known for – like “Run-Around,” “Hook,” “But Anyway,” just to mention a couple of them. Those are kind of staples in the set. And then the rest of the show, we do a kind of a round-robin, where each band member gets to write the setlist for a song. I'm not sure whose set it'll be that night, but everybody has their kind of favorites they like to play from our catalog.

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And then we mix it up with kind of different segues in and out of songs. Sometimes we divide songs in half and then go into another thing, and then kind of go back to it at the end to finish it out. That makes it interesting for us, because it's not just playing the same set every night. And then we strive to be an improvisational band where we have different solo sections for kind of highlighting each of the different members. That's always fun to kind of insert and do little riffs, alluding to different covers and all that kind of stuff.

So, you know, we've been doing this a while, and we've kind of figured out this is the best recipe for us to kind of have an interesting, different show every night, by allowing each of the members to write the set, but also including the songs that people really do know us for and want to hear. We make sure that those are incorporated into each of the sets.

Q: I was talking with Chris Barron from Spin Doctors not too long ago – he was up here doing a solo show, and I didn't realize that he was almost in Blues Traveler. That was kind of a fun little revelation for me. He was saying that it was readily apparent back when this band got together that it was going to be something special – that John was going to make his way and be something, regardless of what the combination was – but that all of you guys, everybody together, just was really a magical thing.

What has been the secret sauce for this band? What has set this band apart from others, and what enabled this band to break out the way it did – and to be able to sustain that now for – what would you say – like the third generation, probably, of Blues Traveler fans?

Brendan Hill: Right, yeah. Well, I mean, obviously we love Chris; and yeah, he was in the band for I think two gigs. Back then, we were kind of a blues band, and we wore like outfits. He refused to wear the tie. And so, we kicked him out, because he wasn't able to wear the tie. We couldn't force him into the box.

But he was great, obviously, as a performer, even back in high school days. And that's the thing, is that we all went to the same high school, the original members, and we moved to New York together. We pitched in all the band income into kind of a shoebox apartment, bought sticks and strings and harps, and gas money, and everything we needed to pay our rent, all out of that income. So, it became very much all for one, one for all mentality from the beginning.

And you know, we had these amazing, fortuitous events, like David Graham, who's the son of Bill Graham, was going to Columbia University while we were kind of coming up in in New York. We played a show up there at Columbia University, which was recorded, and he had the demo tape, or there was sort of a live bootleg of it. And he sent that to his dad in San Francisco. Of course, his dad’s the impresario of Filmore East, Filmore West, and a big show promoter, as well as a manager. He sent us a letter just saying, “Don't sign anything. Wait till I come see the band. Don't sign any agreements.” Because we were sort of being looked at by a couple different record companies.

And so, he came out and was impressed with John and the band, and kind of our catalog at that point, which it was basically we were playing the first album, plus a bunch of other songs that were in our repertoire at that point. So, Bill Graham took us under his wing. We got signed by A&M Records at that point.

I think John, being in the band from early on, is just something which is recognizable, something that blows people away. Like, “Wow, I can't believe he can do that with a harmonica.” Plus, he's got – in my opinion and many others – a really unique, great voice; and also a great songwriter. So, he's kind of like a triple threat there. And so, from the beginning, you know, we would go down to, say, New Orleans, or Atlanta, or someplace with like a little bar gig that we were going to play the next night. And John, and all of us would go around to these little local bars where they were doing sort of blues jam sessions. And we would sign John up, or John would sign himself up to sit in with the band. And as soon as he got up there and started soloing and playing with the band, you know, it was like almost everybody would just stop and like stare at the stage and see what John was doing, and be like, “Oh, my God, who is that?”

So, you know, we kind of had that “it” factor, that special thing, right from the beginning, which not only opened a lot of doors for us, but also allowed John to sit in with bands like Carlos Santana or the Allman Brothers, and so we got to get on those tours.

A lot of very lucky events happened in our life, and with every musician it's a one-in-a-million chance. I think we stacked the odds a little bit in our favor, because John was so unique. But it was also us putting 1,000% of our effort into it. And all of us were just fresh out of high school, saying to our parents, “This is what we want to do.” And they were like, “OK, we'll give you a couple of years.” And then, within a year or two, we were signed. I bought a van, and we were starting to go around the country.

Each of us had a different strength. One of the strengths that Bobby Sheehan, our original bass player had, was that he was a big Grateful Dead head. And every summer during high school, he would take his little Volkswagen bus and travel around the country, seeing a bunch of Dead shows. So, he knew kind of very intimately, or in his psyche, how to kind of make a show different each night, because that's what the Dead do. And also to allow recording – the bootlegs go around, and then that kind of makes the grassroots fanbase build up.

And then Chan (Kinchla) and I, we were sort of the rockers. Chan and I both loved The Police, The Clash, Zeppelin, Sabbath and all that stuff. So, we kind of had that mentality of like, “We need to rock, and we need to blow people away,” kind of thing with our performances. And then you had John on top who was just writing these great songs that were very catchy, but yet also had that kind of improvisational, kind of John Coltrane feel to them, where it's just like every solo was kind of this flurry of bebop of notes that just left people saying when we left town, “Who were those guys?” And then, “Oh, did you get a tape? Oh, check this out!” And then that tape would get copied and then sent all over the place.

So, that's a very long way of answering Chris’ very kind words about our beginnings, which were just basically a lot of luck and a lot of hard effort. And, obviously, we learned how to play together. But we did have a kind of a head start with John being such a unique sort of prodigy.

Q: That's awesome – and, conveniently, Chris left out the whole part about the ties!

Brendan Hill: (Laughs) He did do backflips. He was the only band member, to this point, that can do a backflip – a standing backflip. That was his signature move. He’d sing a song and then do a backflip off the stage. … Without a tie.

Q: You guys are coming at a point in this season where we have a lot of bands that would be categorized as ’90s bands. We've seen a lot more ’90s tours over the past couple of years. What is it about that decade, and about the music, in your estimation, that makes it still resonate the way it does in 2024?

Brendan Hill: Well, you know, there's several different reasons. A couple that come to my mind are the people that are sort of my age, that grew up buying cassettes and records and popping them in their car, listening to a whole album, and having that kind of experience, when they’re like graduating from high school or going to college or doing a road trip with their friends – that kind of thing is instilled in people's psyches. When they hear a band is coming through, they're like, “Oh, man.” You know, it brings them right back. That music group brings them right back. Kind of like John's lyric in “The Hook”: “The hook brings you back.”

So, I think there's a lot of that kind of nostalgia for those days when you had bootlegs, or you had cassettes or records that you would play over and over and over again of your favorite band.

I think also people like myself that have kids that are now in their late teens who are interested in live music and, of course, we've got the Taylor Swifts, the Beyoncé’s, all the big mega-tours, but, bringing your kid to a concert where it's like a live a band performing and doing kind of like a Dead set, like without a net kind of thing, that kind of jamming and rocking out and having fun is unique to a lot of bands that came out in the ’90s. It was like sort of a little bit of an edge to it – a danger.

And so, I think, people my age who have kids, want to expose their kids to that, saying, “This is what I was listening to.”

I do see a lot of young people now at our shows that are either with their parents or without, and it's really cool to see a new generation that appreciates not only songs that they may recognize, but also getting into a band and knowing who the different players are, and if they're good at guitar, drums, bass – whatever it is – because I think a lot of music today is very singer/songwriter-orientated, where it's like the focus is not so much on the band, or how they play together. It's more about the song and the lyrics – which are obviously very important – but having a band that can play, and can elevate or take you someplace else, just with the music alone, is special. I think a lot of people realize that.

And some bands aren't going to be around for a while. I went to see the Stones and The Who, and all those bands that I love, on their latest tours, because it's something that you may not get to see again live – and live is very special.

That's why I think supporting live music, supporting bands, supporting clubs and bars and theaters that have live music, is really important. And also, music school, and music education, is really important – teaching kids how to play together and be creative is one of the staples to my youth, and it'd be sad if it was kind of cut because of budget cuts, etc.