Seattle rapper Travis Thompson’s playful sound is guided by rhymes that combine evocative description and candid emotion.
A protégé of Macklemore, he released music independently beginning in 2015. After being featured on Mackelmore’s 2017 song “Corner Store,” he made his major-label debut with the 2019 EP Runaways, which he followed the same year with the album Reckless Endangerment. His third LP, the 2021’s BLVD BOY, featured guest spots from the likes of G-Easy and Juicy J.
Raised partly in suburban White Center and based in Burien, Washington, Travis Thompson began writing rhymes as a school kid but became more serious about pursuing music as a career in his late teens. He released his debut EP, Living for the Future, in 2015.
Around that time, local icons Macklemore and Ryan Lewis founded a youth program called The Residency, which brought in local promoters, agents, and others with behind-the-scenes knowledge of managing a career in the arts to speak to low-income kids. Thompson signed on, reportedly impressing Macklemore not only with his rapping skills but with his enthusiasm; Thompson returned to the program as a paid intern the following year. In the meantime, he released the Ambaum mixtape in 2016.
His big break came in late 2017 when Macklemore featured Thompson alongside Dave B on the single “Corner Store.” They performed the song on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, marking Thompson’s television debut. He followed up with the album YouGood? in mid-2018. After signing with Blvd Boys/Epic, Thompson released the Runaways EP in early 2019 which set the table for the full-length Reckless Endangerment later that year.
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