Travis

Features • Monday October 5th, 2009 • 12:00 am

Fran Healy is looking backwards and he likes what he sees. Over the next few weeks, the Travis front man and principal songwriter is taking his act on the road with band mate Andy Dunlop for a stripped-down retrospective tour sweeping the States. And in the process, Healy says he’s finding new life in old songs and realizing things about his career for the first time.

SSv: The upcoming tour allows you to really strip things down. Where did that idea originate? Just for something different?

Fran Healy: If you’ve seen the band before, you know that Travis is a pretty intimate band anyway. And I think an opportunity to see more into that side is an interesting proposition. I mean, how do you get more intimate? [Laughs] I guess you just have to break it down a little and play in smaller venues. I think the show originated from being asked to do a show in Austria last year that was very last minute. We turned up and we just said, ‘What are we going to do?’

I sat and I thought, ‘Why not just start with the first song I wrote and end with the last song that I wrote and then play a bunch of songs in between?’ I thought I could make it like a lecture – a songwriting lecture. This gig in Austria was really amazing. The radio station that put this show on was flooded with e-mails and calls. All the people there were just freakin’ out. It was fun because it was this townhall meeting. It had that vibe about it.

That day I got on the phone with our manager and said, ‘Look, I’d love to do this but do it in America, for instance.’ From that idea sprang this tour that we’re now doing – this big long tour – and then try to make the next record while we’re doing this thing. We’ve got our work cut out for us, but it should be a lot of fun.

SSv: Is that important for you to stop from time to time and think about the course of your work from beginning to end?

Fran: I think so, yes. And also to sit there and listen to the records to see exactly what is it that you’ve done and how you’ve gone about it. Every record that we’ve done, we’ve always tried to do them a little bit differently. The first album we recorded in two weeks and then the second album we recorded it all over the place for about a year – that was The Man Who. The third album, we went to L.A. and we did it in this nice California sunshine. The fourth album, we did it in a secluded Scottish fishing village. Then with this one, we gave ourselves about 10 days to record 10 tracks on a 16 track machine and tried to make it sound like a record.

Each time we’ve gone out to record has been so different, so each album has a different sort of vibe. Of course, there’s a common thread running through. I don’t know what the next album will be like, but the plan to record it in this fashion should definitely have an effect on the songs.

SSv: When you look back through the albums, do you personally hear how those instances affected the music so much?

Fran: Well, not so much the California vibe, but I look back on that album, for instance, but I have the experiences come flashing back – like having Nigel [Godrich] totally screwing me to get this vocal and yelling at me, ‘It’s not good enough! It’s not good enough!’ [Laughs] Then eventually when you think you’ve sung the worst vocal you’ve ever sun in your life, he’s like, ‘That was the one!’ So I’ve got post-traumatic stress from all of these experiences with Nigel and others. [Laughs] No, I’m only kidding.

The exciting thing about the tour though is this idea is showing people where the songs are coming from or even where in the world literally the songs come from. For instance, people probably don’t know that “Why Does It Always Rain on Me?” was written in Israel and in Milan as well – such a rainy song came from two very hot places. There are so many stories to tell and it depends on how we organize the set list. In the next week, we’re going to sit down and sort all of that out, but I think it will be a great experience for people.

SSv: Will the set list be static or will it change from town to town?

Fran: There will be a pretty static set list. However, interwoven, there will be about seven or eight songs that will change probably on a nightly basis. If we’re doing three nights in one place, it will be different every night. But you can’t play a gig without playing your hits, so we’ll definitely play a hit-laden set. And there will also be some surprises.

SSv: Like a cover or two?

Fran: Yeah, we’ve definitely done a few of them in our time.

SSv: Right.

Fran: [Laughs] I had a thought the other night about one of the first gigs we ever played as a band in Glasgow at this place called the ABC. Or maybe it was the Apollo. It doesn’t really matter. But we covered this song by Neil Diamond in the Jazz Singer called “Baby, Baby.” I was thinking, ‘Shit, man, if we’re going to do covers, we might as well do our first cover.’ It was a great song so Andy and I might sing that as well.

SSv: When you look back on those old records, is there a song that you’ve warmed up to over the years that you didn’t like so much before?

Fran: Not really. If I don’t like a song, it just never makes it onto a record. If there’s a borderline song that made it onto a record, then I don’t like them later. Usually when a record comes out with a song that I had to be persuaded to put it on there, I’m listening to it later thinking, ‘Damn, I was right. I shouldn’t have listened to anyone.’ It’s never the other way around like, ‘Oh, I love this song now.’ [Laughs]

SSv: Any surprises among the hits? Any reaction like, ‘I can’t believe this was the song that caught on like it did?’

Fran: No, being in a band, when success comes, you’re actually in another place. I mean, it’s happening to the songs themselves, not for you. It’s just out there somewhere on the radio and you’re doing your own thing. You just watch it bemused while you’re doing a million other things. Looking back on it, I always thought when we recorded “Driftwood” that it was a number one hit. It sounded amazing and it was a really great pop song and has this great heart to it.

It never did make it. It was like number 12 or something, so I thought it underperformed. But in the long run, it doesn’t matter. I realize now that in the long run, whether it goes to number one or not, it doesn’t matter. But if enough people get to hear it and then make it their favorite song, then that’s what matters.

SSv: Has that changed over the years – what really matters to you?

Fran: Oh, man, that’s a great question, because it definitely changes. When you’re 24, the days pass slower and when you’re on tour, it’s really quite hard because you start off sharing bedrooms with your band mates in a shitty transit van. We did that for two years and eventually we got our first tour bus. I remember thinking it was amazing to have our own bunks. Then obviously we got our own hotel rooms, albeit in a shitty hotel. [Laughs]

Then we got really successful and you find yourself flying business class on long-haul flights. You have your own bus and your own rooms and you get used to that. Some bands like U2 and Coldplay go on to have their own separate planes. [Laughs] But those circumstances definitely change.

On an emotional basis, I feel more attracted to touring now. Time goes by so much faster, so a week out feels perfect. It doesn’t feel like two or three weeks. I remember in 1999 when we were touring America, there was no end in sight. I would look and it would be full of gigs on the diary for like seven months. It would get me down. But now it’s great.

I think now, I’m just older and I consider myself to be one of the… I don’t know but we’re still around and we’re still going and we’ve been in this Brit-pop movement of sorts. There’s so many great bands still coming out. There’s so much out there about the music business, but it’s great to still be here.

At the root, however, I’m still the same person. The same things still make me laugh and the same things still make me say, ‘Oh, I can’t be bothered.’

SSv: Has your approached to the songwriting craft changed at all?

Fran: No that’s very much the same. It’s fishing around in the dark for the thing you need. You’re not quite sure what it is that you’re looking for. You’re not quite sure what it is and you’re not quite sure where you are. Thankfully, that doesn’t get any easier or harder. It just stays the same and I think people panic when they have some hits – everyone does and that includes myself. People are like, ‘Fuck, I’ll never do that again.’ [Laughs] But you get past that panic and you move on.