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Chandler Travis likes to mess with people.
His music career has spanned over forty years, including as a member of Travis, Shook and the Club Wow (with Steven Shook), a duo that appeared on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson and toured with George Carlin. And he seems to have found a way to walk the line of establishing his credibility as an innovative musician with an outrageous live act. The New Yorker described Travis as, “…irreverent guitarist, singer, and composer …who is not above performing barefoot and in his pajamas, delivers mind-bending wordplay over Dixieland jazz, shimmering rock, and horn-fueled R & B”
For Travis, being an artist is all about being willing to present concepts and performances that challenge the audience. He told me, “It’s really the artist’s job to be provocative and to do things that people wouldn’t do in real life but that you get to see done. It’s like the Marx Brothers. You would never want to have the Marx Brothers over in real life. That is just fucking mayhem.”
“But it’s just so much fun to see people behave all out wrongly.”
Travis explained how this ethos informed how he approached his album with the Chandler Travis Philharmonic, Tarnation and Alastair Sim (AKA Kitty). “That whole album … we were just trying to do everything wrong at once. I think it’s the same impulse that makes you look at your house sometimes and want to blow it up,” Travis explained. “Where you go, ‘I’m so used to this … I’ve been trying to do this right for so long. It would be fun to go the opposite direction entirely. I don’t think it’s an unusual thing.”
“It’s probably unusual to give into it as much as we do.”
Part of what is so appealing to Travis about being irreverent is that it allows him to connect with people who are likeminded. “It’s just the kindred spirit thing. To me 90% of music is garbage. But the 10% that I love is just pure heaven. And it’s that way with people,” he said. “You want to bring somebody to see this band that you just love to death … and you hit them with something that’s designed to test the audience. You just don’t know what they’re going to do. And it usually works out badly.”
“And a lot of people don’t care if they piss off nine people to get to that one person they love.”
In order to be able to pull off his approach to his music and performing, Travis not only has to have distance from the audience, but also needs to truly not care how they react. “I’m a big believer that when I’m at a gig, I kind of like not to be with the audience. I don’t like to hang out there. There should be some separation. It demystifies things, it makes them a regular person. And it’s usually kind of disappointing,” Travis described. “To do the kind of thing that I like to do anyway, it really is your job not to care that much about the reaction. You have to be laying something out there for folks, and you can’t try to predict what’s going to be popular.”
“Or at least it’s important to me that there are people who try to do that.”
And yet perhaps paradoxically, it is that very willingness to rebel and challenge that is perhaps a universal need. He discussed how comics such as Louis C.K. and The Marx Brothers tapped into people’s need to be irreverent.
“We’re sort of all descended from the jesters and fools. Certainly there’s a lot of people that are remarkable because … they talk about something universal that people just connect with,” Travis explained. “Like Louis C.K. … he’s connecting by saying things that people don’t usually say, but they feel a lot. But he also does the Marx Brothers thing where he says things that you would never say and don’t want to think.”
“But it’s in there somewhere.”
To be sure, after four decades of performing, Travis’ music and live act is connecting. In 2016, Chandler Travis Philharmonic put out a new album, Waving Kissyhead Vol. 2&1, which was described by Glide Magazine as, “bursting with brassy sounds and delivers a much-needed jolt of euphoric energy.” And Impose Magazine raved, “With its burst of pure energy and beautiful attention to detail, the album is one that we believe should be in everyone’s collection.”
And when challenging people works, why change things up? “I’m so amazed that I don’t know any more about my business than I did 40 years ago,” Travis said. “Every night is a fresh battle with new conditions, and you have no idea how it’s going to work out.”
“It’s a total fucking crap shoot every time.”
Michael A. Friedman, Ph.D., is a clinical psychologist with offices in Manhattan and South Orange, NJ, and is a member of EHE International’s Medical Advisory Board. Contact Dr. Mike at michaelfriedmanphd.com. Follow Dr. Mike on Twitter @drmikefriedman
