Travis: Melody Maker, December 20/27, 1997

My First Gig

This week, FRAN HEALY of TRAVIS remembers the night he spent with 1,000 screaming girls, his mate Brian--and mid-Eighties one-hit wonder Owen Paul.

"The first gig I ever went to, in all honesty, was Owen Paul. That's quite lo-fi, isn't it?
"The reason why was that my friend Brian Butler won tickets in a raffle and asked, 'Do you want to come?' So Brian, if you're out there, you were the man who introduced me to live music!
"It was at the Pavilion Theater in Glasgow. I was about 12--and we were the only two guys in the audience. I swear to God, there were no other boys there. So it was quite a good deal!
"It was an amazing gig. It was just mental. It was like the gig we played last night--kids screaming and going totally apeshit. It didn't really matter what was happening on stage.

"I just remember going, 'This is amazing! This is totally top!'--not thinking, 'God, I'd love to do this.' There were a lot of scarves with his name written on them--and a lot of Celtic scarves. The story on Owen Paul was that his big brother played for Celtic, and I was a huge Celtic fan at the the time. The thing was that I thought he played for one of the reserve teams or something, and then I found out weeks or months later that it was his brother!
"I remember it being really funny, with all these women screaming from beginning to end, and little girls fainting, and all that. He only lasted for about six months and then disappeared off the face of the planet, but we was a Glasgow boy and this was a home gig, so it was the equivalent of going to see someone like ... what's that fucking band ... 911, or something like that. Horrible boy pop!
"I can remember thinking that I didn't really like the music, even at that age. But the vibe was totally electric--all the energy that all these little pre-pubescent girls were giving off. There must have been about a thousand of them. We were right up in the gods, and you looked down and there was a riot going on.
"At first, they were all looking at us--like, 'What the fuck are you doing here?' But the novelty wore off for them when Owen Paul came on. They didn't pay us any attention after that.
"You came out and you were buzzing for about four fucking hours afterwards. I've never been to anything like that since, strangely enough--apart from our own gigs. We're about to start doing some dates, so maybe I'm about to experience some trouble from the best seat in the house--but I doubt it'll be that mad. I fucking hope not! That was embarrassingly mad!"
Melody Maker
December 20/27, 1997

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