Travis returned to Glasgow last Tuesday (October 5) to play their first hometown gig since an immensely successful summer. Their Barrowlands performance came as a double celebration, with Scotland winning their Euro 2000 qualifying match against Bosnia on the same day. Fran collected his thoughts after a tumultuous gig.
So tell us then, how was it for you?
We hoped it would be special, but we could never have imagined it would start like that. That has to be one of the most amazing experiences of my life, it was so loud!
You're referring to the deafening cheers of the crowd when you came on?
We'd had the PA turned right up when we were soundchecking, and it's a big PA here. Then when we started the gig, we had to double the volume, just so we could try and hear what was
happening--you couldn't hear a thing onstage. It was qiute stunning, like all those stories you hear about the Beatles not being able to hear themselves think, let alone play.
The first song, "All I Wanna Do Is Rock," blew me away. For the first six or seven songs, especially on "Why Does It Always Rain on Me," "Driftwood," and "Happy"--ah, man, it was incredible. Things calmed down a wee bit, then it was excelelnt. We could hear what we were doing.
Playing in Glasgow must always be amazing?
Yes, it's our hometown, and today's my girlfriend's birthday, so we're having a drink later on. And all my family are here tonight. I've been looking for my mum--she'll probably be the one at the bar, breakdancing and body-popping.
How different is it to the last time you played Glasgow?
The summer was amazing--a Number One album and a load of fantastic festivals. The thing about Glasgow is that some people love you, and others totally go for you neck, totally hate you. It's the same in the old days, when we were starting, and it's the same now. It's this or that in Glasgow, and I don't think it'll ever change.
And to cap it all, the album's just gone double platinum.
It's mental. It's weird, strange. I never think about record sales. I'm always thinking about how many times the songs have been played on the radio. When I write a song, that's the thing I consider. People don't need to buy it--how many records do you know that you don't have? So I always look at the airplay charts. Selling records, I suppose it's kinda like cool. Great!
And Scotland even won the football!
Yeah, we should sack the tour manager. Poeple in the crowd were holding their fingers up in the air to try and tell us the score. I didn't know what they were doing, though. At least Scotland won!
Have you experienced a gig like that before?
The only thing I remember--you know we did the tours with Oasis? We started in Dublin, we did this huge venue, a big hangar, Liam's throat was fucked that night, and Noel did the show himself. He did "Whatever" and "Wonderwall" acoustically, and the crowd sang every word. They even sang along to the violin bits and the guitar intros--15,000 people together. It was incredible to watch. Magic.
And that was you at the Barrowlands gig?
I don't think quite yet, but since we've had the Number One record, doors have opened for us throughout the world that were only open to the likes of Oasis or Mariah Carey before. We just got back from Japan, and it was mad there. We played a gig in Germany--it was just mental, so weird, but I think there's so much further for us to go still.
It's just keeping things going now. We played a new song tonight which went down really well, and I'm now just looking forward to writing the next record. I'm not really fucking paying any attention to this back-slapping nonsense. It's the songs that matter.
One stunning thing happened to us yesterday. We went back for a drink in The Horseshoe bar, a small veune and bar where we played our first-ever gig in front of no more than about 14 people. It hadn't changed very much, and it really didn't seem that long ago we were playing there. It was only when we left that we noticed there was one of those blue plaques screwed to the wall outside that read, "Travis, the band who recorded the Number One The Man Who album, played their first gig here."
That was mind-blowing.
Melody Maker
October 16, 1999
This week: Fran Healy on Glasgow, football, and his Mum's dancing.
