PAT TRAVERS
The Pat Travers Band

Pat Travers is one of the few guitarists who can be featured as both a Blues artist and a Heavy Metal artist. Born in Toronto, Canada almost 42 years ago, and playing professionally for over 25 of those years, Pat has more than paid his dues. Drawing on the influences of Hendrix, Clapton, Beck, and Page, Pat has established himself as someone who doesn't take a back seat to anyone when it comes to a live show. At the age of 20, Pat crossed the ocean to try his hand at the British music scene. Trademarks of his early shows included giving away cardboard replicas of his black Fender Telecaster, playing barefoot, and inviting audience member to play "air guitar" on stage during the show.

It was after the release of his album Putting It Straight that Pat returned to the North America as the trend in the UK was leaning towards the punk rock revolution instead of the hard blues driven rock that Pat was producing. Enlisting the talents of Mars Cowling on bass, Pat teamed up with Pat Thrall on guitar, and Tommy Aldredge on drums. This would become the band that would record perhaps his best known song Boom Boom.

More and more Pat was being considered a guitar hero, a description he himself was less comfortable with. Pat preferred to express himself more musically than with speed and trickery. Pat's first priority was more in the music than showing off what he could do on the guitar. Mired with problems with management, and with legal problems with Polydor, Pat soon stepped out of the recording industry disenchanted with the whole idea of being a 'guitar hero'. Instead he continued to tour and kept his contact with the thousands and thousands of fans he had from all the previous years.

Having been without a US based recording label for many years Pat signed with Mike Varney's Blues Bureau International label in the US. The release of Blues Tracks in 1993 further expanded Pat's library of sound. The next releaseHalfway to Somewhere has to be Pat's strongest Blues Bureau release as of late, featuring more of the classic blues based guitar that fans crave for.

In retrospect, Pat is gaining a resurgence in his career. After overcoming many problems that would have made most to give it up, Pat still pushes on. Not only does Pat find himself once again climbing towards the top, he can also enjoy it with his family who keep him motivated to do what he does best . . . making some of the best music possible.