Travis Keller

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Travis Keller is an American music journalist, record label owner and photographer based in Hollywood, California^[1].

As a writer, his editorial approach has been compared to Lester Bangs due to its unflinching, occasionally acrid nature.^{[citation needed]} He is a founder of the online magazine, Buddyhead, and the related record label, Buddyhead Records. He co-founded both with Aaron North, guitarist of Jubilee, ex-guitarist of Nine Inch Nails and The Icarus Line. North and Keller started Buddyhead after meeting in Idaho in 1996^[2].

Buddyhead's cultural and music coverage and popular gossip page helped Keller and North get shortlisted among the 100 most creative in Entertainment in 2004 by Entertainment Weekly ^[3]. Their governance of the website needled Hollywood elite and narrowly avoided legal skirmishes with Courtney Love and Fred Durst^[4] .

In the June issue of the British Music Magazine called Kerrang, Keller was named #37 in their "Top 100 Most Powerful People In Rock" list^[5].

Keller work as a photographer has appeared in magazine's such as Tape OP and Rolling Stone and on albums by bands such as At The Drive-In, Jubilee and Jimmy Eat World. He's toured as a photographer with bands including The Stooges, Dead Meadow, Tool, The Icarus Line, Primal Scream, A Perfect Circle, Queens of the Stone Age, Autolux, Nine Inch Nails, Bauhaus, The Dillinger Escape Plan, The Get Up Kids, At The Drive-In and Ink & Dagger^[6]. A book of his photography has been announced via Buddyhead message boards for a 2008 publication.

As a videographer, he's made videos for The Icarus Line ("Feed A Cat To Your Cobra"), Your Enemies Friends ("Back Of A Taxi") and Maynard James Keenan project, Pusicfer ("Dozo")^[7].

He's even been characterized, somewhat contradictorily, as both a taste-maker and a "shit talker"^[8].

Billed as simply "DJ Travis Keller," he's held residence at The El Rey Theatre, The Henry Fonda Music Box and Nokia Theatre in Los Angeles^[9] and appeared at Goldenvoice's Coachella Music Festival as well as LA Weekly's Detour Festival.

Tuesday May 13th, Travis started hosting and DJing "The Only Rock N' Roll Night In Los Angeles" with other rock enthusiasts Shepard Fairey (of Obey Giant fame^[10]), Troy Boy, C-Minus^[11] and Jesse Hughes (musician) of Eagles of Death Metal. The night is held at Bar Lubitsch ^[12] (7702 Santa Monica Blvd West Hollywood, CA 90046) every Tuesday night from 10PM until the bar closes at 2AM. LA Metblog ^[13] said "You’ll hear everything from from The Beatles to Iggy Pop to Two Lone Swordsmen to BRMC to Broadcast to Black Sabbath to Captain Beefheart to Yeah Yeah Yeahs to Jackson 5 to Black Flag to Pulp to The Faces to Bikini Kill to The Stone Roses to Funkadelic to Jesus & Mary Chain to Frank Black to Gang of Four to Shocking Blue to Roky Erickson to The Rolling Stones to Bob Dylan to James Gang to The Velvet Underground to Neil Young to Neil Diamond to Bad Brains to Depeche Mode to Howlin’ Wolf to Ike & Tina to Primal Scream to The Gun Club to Gary Glitter to Grand Funk Railroad to The Stooges to Kaleidoscope to Willie Williams to The Doors to The Happy Mondays to Dinosaur Jr to Blackstrap to Blur to Woody to Oasis to The Creation to Led Zeppelin to Spacemen 3 to Joy Division to CCR to The Verve to Jane’s Addiction to Kasabian to Lou Reed to James to Flipper to PIL to Kraftwerk to Flying Burrito Brothers to Mudhoney to CSNY to The Jam to Circle Jerks to James Brown to The Clash to…. basically if it has a guitar and it’s good we’ll play it."^[14]