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Formed in 1983, Blues Traveler has grown a passionate following for its sweaty, titanic live shows which often found its members jamming endlessly into the night.

RICHMOND, Ind. — Blues Traveler brings its renowned improvisational live show to Earlham College on Friday, Oct. 13, during Homecoming and Reunion Weekend.

The show begins at 8:30 p.m. in the Performance Gym of Earlham's Athletics and Wellness Center. Tickets for the concert, which is part of the College's Artist and Lecture Series, are available at the Runyan Center Desk and cost $20.

An American jam band from Princeton, N.J., Blues Traveler is best known among fans for extended live shows filled with emotion and raw power. The blues-rock group has eight albums, six gold or platinum plaques and sales of more than 10 million discs.

Although Blues Traveler has built a cult-like following for its explosive live performances, the general public may be more familiar with the band's studio album four. Released in 1994, the album produced two radio-friendly singles, Hook and the Grammy Award-winning Run-Around, which highlights John Popper's playful lyrics and amazing harmonica playing.

Joining frontman Popper is Chan Kinchla on guitar and brother Tad Kinchla on bass, Brendan Hill on drums, and Ben Wilson on keyboards.

Blues Traveler reached the top of the jam rock mountain and the pop charts fairly early and then experimented with different styles and projects including a solo album Zygote by Popper. The band began to wear down after more than 15 years on the touring cycle and decided to take a break.

"We were frazzled," says guitarist Chan Kinchla. "So we took a year off because we were just burnt out." Founding bassist Bob Sheehan died in 1999 during the break.

The band regrouped in 2001 and released Bridge and Truth Be Told. The group's latest album, ¡Bastardos!, was released in Sept. 2005 and showcases the wide range of Popper's vocals. The album centers on songs about falling in and out of love and what can happen before and after heartbreak.

"This is just us being completely ourselves, and not thinking about what we should be doing," says Chan Kinchla, noting that on previous albums the band spent maybe a little too much energy trying to appease everybody — from labels to producers to all of their fans. "Before we made this record, we decided, 'Let's just make records that we love and regardless of how they do commercially, at least we love'em and they're all ours.'"

While ¡Bastardos! may not have been written and recorded with the radio in mind, that endless hooky side of Blues Traveler — be it in Kinchla's riffing or Popper's vocals and harmonica blasts — is still very much intact. They remain one of the few bands of the jam scene that can actually back up its grooves with carefully crafted songs and stories that are both witty and catchy.

Blues Traveler transformed the jam scene in the early 1990s via its beloved H.O.R.D.E. (Horizons of Rock Developing Everywhere) festivals, and today the band plays to sold-out crowds at such massive outdoor venues as Red Rocks in Colorado, Wolf Trap in Virginia and Pine Knob in Michigan.