Travis Dickerson

Travis Dickerson is an American musician and producer, best known for his work with Buckethead and Viggo Mortensen. He also runs "TDRSmusic", a recording studio with its own record label that has recorded and released albums by Bill Laswell, Jethro Tull, Linda Ronstadt, and Vince DiCola. Dickerson can be heard playing keyboards on many albums he recorded or produced.

Life & Work

Travis Dickerson was raised in Michigan, where his father was an arts teacher at the "Central Michigan University". When Travis was ten years old, his father exchanged an old piano for a painting and Travis got it to work again.

Together with his brothers he early made some musical experiments, first recordings and later moved to Los Angeles where he met the punk band "X". In his new studio in Chatsworth a bunch of the band's releases as well as some solo projects were recorded.Singer Exene Cervenka introduced Dickerson to Viggo Mortensen, starting a long friendship. Nearly all of Mortensen's albums since then were recorded or distributed by TDRS.

In 1994 Dickerson played keyboards on "County Fair 2000", an album by Phil Alvin (of "The Blasters") and in 1998 he appeared on "Shocking Pink Banana Seat" by singer-songwriter Susan James. He also wrote the liner notes for the anthology "Beyond And Back" by "X" in 1997.
Buckethead and Dickerson met in San Francisco, and Buckethead being disappointed of major record labels found a new home for his many releases in TDRS. Dickerson played keyboards on several Buckethead recordings and in 2001 they formed "Thanatopsis", a band combining Jazz and Rock styles. Released as a Buckethead album, "Population Override" likewise featured a large contribution from Dickerson in both composition and performance in 2004. "Chicken Noodles", a series of jazz influenced jams followed in 2006. Additionally Dickerson remastered the early Cornbugs albums, a fun project Buckethead ran with actor Bill Moseley and played on the last two recordings of the band before the split up.

Discography (partial)

*"Phil Alvin" - "County Fair 2000" (1994)
*"Susan James" - "Shocking Pink Banana Seat" (1998)
*"Death Cube K" - "Tunnel" (1999)
*"Cobra Strike" - "13th Scroll" (1999)
*"Cobra Strike II" - "Cobra Strike II - Y, Y+B, X+Y" (2000)
*"Thanatopsis" - "Thanatopsis" (2001)
*"Thanatopsis" - "Axiology" (2003)
*"Viggo Mortensen" - "Pandemoniumfromamerica" (2003)
*"Viggo Mortensen" - "Please Tomorrow" (2004)
*"Lindy Dickerson" - "Carry Me Away" (2004)
*"Cornbugs" - "Brain Circus" (2004)
*"Cornbugs" - "Donkey Town" (2004)
*"Buckethead" - "Population Override" (2004)
*"Gorgone" - "Gorgone" (2005)
*"Viggo Mortensen" - "Intelligence Failure" (2005)
*"Thanatopsis" - "Anatomize" (2006)
*"Buckethead & Travis Dickerson" - "Chicken Noodles" (2006)
*"Buckethead & Travis Dickerson" - "Chicken Noodles II" (2007)
*"Alix Lambert & Travis Dickerson" - "Running After Deer" (2008)
*"Buckethead, Brain and Travis Dickerson" - "The Dragons of Eden" (2008)
*"Buckethead" - "Albino Slug" (2008)

Sources

* [http://www.tlchicken.com/view_story.php?ARTid=1852 Interview with monkeybe, Dezember 2003]
* [http://pureveruca.blogspot.com/2007/06/interview-with-travis-dickerson.html Interview with Veruca Salt, Juni 2007]
* [http://www.bingebuddies.com/html%20texte/Buckethead%20Interview%20@%20riffage_com.htm Interview of Buckethead with Riffage, 1999]

External links

* [http://tdrsmusic.com Website of TDRS Music]