When Angels Talk

TRAVIS are the heirs apparent to Britpop's thorny crown, and they insist the gift is divine.

Some bands have all the luck. Take fortunate Glaswegian sons Travis, for instance. No sooner had the feckless four-piece formed than a scratchy demo tape found its way into the hands of Andy MacDonald, head honcho of one of the UK's most prestigious labels, Go! Discs. Good news? Bad news. The exec had just sold his company for a tasty $15 million. But wait! After witnessing just one of the band's high-octane concerts, MacDonald told Travis frontman Fran Healy that he was planning on forming a new firm, Independiente. And how would Travis like to be his first roll-the-dice signing?

What the hell? thought Healy. They like this MacDonald character, thought he was an honorable fellow. Travis inked a deal. Then: pandemonium. Word wildfired through the Britpop scene--who were these anonymous new musicians upon which the Go! Discs founder was betting the family farm? After moving to London, the group rocketed up the showbill pecking order and was soon headlining over local favorites such as Embrace. Even Oasis's finicky Noel Gallagher recently cited Travis as one of his new faves; putting his money where his mouth is, he also invited the group to open several Oasis tour dates. But an album had to be finished, solid sonic evidence to support this storm in a teacup. And who should jump on board as a producer? None other than Steve Lillywhite himself. The resulting album, Good Feeling, makes the case clear. Travis's fame is no accident.

On the contrary, grins the spiritual-minded Healy, over an afternoon tea in the restaurant of his New York hotel. "It's the angels. The angels just floatin' about, ya know?" And if you don't know, the singer will quickly inform you. It all started a few years ago, he explains, when Travis was ust beginning to experiment in the studio. "We were working with Niko Bolas, who had produced Keith Richards, and it was him who taught us about the angels. One day, he was working with Keith, and Keith had done something on the guitar. Niko played the tape back and said, 'How the fuck did you do that?' And Keith went, 'Ah, it's the angels, mate!' Niko started getting into the philosophy, and he passed it on to us. 'The angels' is like an X-word for maybe nature or something."

Healy sighs and rests his chin in his hands. He knows it sounds far-fetched. "But I'm a great believer in the fact that there's something out there that puts out songs. If we never do another album in our career, that's not what the whole picture is about. The whole picutre is about making something that's good and true and makes people feel something in their heart."

Bassist Dougie Payne, the wacky Ralph Malph to Healy's straight-faced Richie Cunningham, nods his head in agreement. "It could be a painting," he adds helpfully. "Or maybe just a really good sandwich."

Healy, however, is still in serious mode. "It could be anything, but it comes out through different people, and it chooses who it comes through. Because 90 percent of the time, any writer writes averagely. Well, me, personally speaking, that is. But 10 percent of the time, something special happens, and that 10 percent doesn't feel like you've done it. And you've got no control over it. I write the songs for the band, all you have to do is sit down and hope that it'll happen--you've just gotta be there and hope that it still trusts you as a vessel for it. Still trusts you as its guardian."

Irrational? Possibly. But Healy isn't alone in such way-out assessments. Countless modern songwriters--from newcomers John Power and Crispian Mills to more established stars like James's Tim Booth and Simple Minds' Jim Kerr--believe in a loose universal theory that their music is already written, wafting homeless through the cosmos, and just waiting for the perfect, clear, starlit night to beam itself down. Call it channelling, if you will, but the phenomenon simply defies logical explanation. Question the gift, they all agree, and it's gone. Or, as Healy deftly puts it, "Artists are so self-important, so stuck up their own asses when they're discussing their work, they actually think it's them that's done it."

Certainly there's a bit of unearthly magic hovering around Good Feeling. From the opening bars of "All I Want to Do Is Rock," you know you're in the presence of something special: guitars flutter and drone casually, like a dragonfly surveying a particularly inviting pond, before Healy's subtly majestic voice sweeps through, bellows-breathing sparkly life into simple sentiments like, "Hey, I would really like to talk with you/Girl, do you have the time to stop?/Say, all I wanna do is rock." Healy says he intended the track to be a declaration of purpose for Travis (name nicked from Harry Dean Stanton's character in Paris, Texas). And that's about all he understands about it. "I wrote 'All I Wanna Do Is Rock,' but I don't know how," he swears. "How could I? It wrote itself--it's weird." The rest of the record? Loping, easygoing cuts such as "U16 Girls," "Good Day to Die," and "The Line Is Fine"? The composer smiles secretively. "Any song that's on the album is the 10 percent that I was talking about. I never even let him hear the other 90 percent," he adds, playfully smacking his pal Payne on the arm. "It's embarrassing, because that's my stuff, not the angels' stuff."

Figures Healy would be a failed art student. Attending the Glasgow School of Art was frustrating for him. "I never finished a painting--I was too young, only 17, I wasn't ready. I hadn't really lived." Songwriting was his medium, he just didn't know it at the time. Now 24, he's come to a fundamental creative conclusion: "Songs are there long after bands die, and for me the most important thing is the song. Who wrote 'Somewhere over the Rainbow'? I don't fucking know. But I'll always remember that song. So the here and and now for me and for Travis doesn't matter. If our music can survive, that's the main thing. And that's what will prove whether or not it was the angels, and not just something comes from your head."

Healy gets so worked up chatting about his theories, he drops the teaspoon with which he's been fidgeting for some 30-odd minutes. It no longer looks like a teaspoon--it's bent at a 45-degree angle.Did this alterna-scene psychic do it with his mind, like Uri Geller?

"No, he didn't!" snickers Payne. "It wasn't him at all! It was...uh...the angels!"

Raygun
November 1997
by Tom Lanham
photos by Spiros Politis

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