With a heavy heart I arrive at this, the last in the trio of blogs about the band Travis. If you only knew the 'hits' then hopefully the 'Deeper Dozen' gave you more to chew on. This blog focusses on lesser known singles, album tracks and b-sides by the band. The fact that this instalment was fairly easy to write is testament to the depth of material that Travis have put out over the years. They are not a group to 'front load' albums with a few singles and leave the rest as filler nor would they put out a single and flesh it out with a few remixes as you are about to find out!
“20” - Fan favourite and b-side to ‘All I Want To Do is Rock’. This acoustic number sees Fran Healy articulately sing the listener through the trials and tribulations of your teenage years.
Village Man - Travis are an excellent b-sides band as demonstrated by ‘Village Man’ which is in my top 10 Travis songs let alone b-sides! This stirring anthem appeared on ‘Why does it always rain on me?’ and would have made a fine single if they had wanted it to.
Baby One More Time - Travis have endearingly covered and applied their own stamp on a number of songs that have ended up on b-sides and in live sets. The list includes ‘Be My Baby’ (The Ronettes), ‘River’ (Joni Mitchell), 'I Kissed a Girl’ (Katy Perry), ‘The Weight’ (The Band) and ‘All the Young Dudes’ (Bowie/ Mott the Hoople). This Britney cover is likely the most famous. It was first performed on a live session for Mark and Lard’s Radio 1 show. The idea to perform the song was stumbled upon the night before during a drunken evening jamming in the pub. You can find it on the b-side to ‘Turn’.
The Connection - 'The Connection' is beautifully world weary and contains some lovely ‘The Shadows’ style guitar courtesy of Andy Dunlop. For many years each Travis single would be released on two CDs each adorned with different tracks. The ‘Coming Around’ single was no exception. This touching song can be found on a CD (and on Spotify of course) alongside Dougie Payne's excellent 'Just the Faces Change'.
The Distance - Whilst this ‘Teenage Fanclub-esque’ tune featured on mid career compilation ‘Singles’ it was the anomaly in that set given that it was never released as a single. It appeared as one of two new songs (alongside the delightful chime of ‘Walking in the Sun’). The song was also noteworthy in the collection as it was penned and sung by Dougie Payne.
Eyes Wide Open - Following Healy’s beautiful falsetto on ‘Battleships’, ‘Eyes Wide Open’ appears when you least expect it on ‘The Boy with No Name’. In the same vein as ‘Blue Flashing Light’ this track menacingly thumps and thuds for three glorious minutes.
New Amsterdam - The closing track from ‘The Boy With No Name’ is one of the ‘prettiest’ things Travis have committed to disc. As was the fashion on CDs for a while, final tracks would be followed by a hidden track. Travis often saved some of their best moments for these songs. ’Blue Flashing Light’ follows ‘Slide Show’ on the ‘The Man Who’; ‘Some Sad Song’ comes after ‘Walking Down the Hill’ on ’12 Memories’ whilst ‘Sailing Away’ and ‘Perfect Heaven Space’, both great, follow on from ‘New Amsterdam’.
Song to Self - Slightly out of step with the rest of the record, the final single from ‘Ode to J Smith’ was evidence that the band was still more than capable of producing fine heart on sleeve arena ready anthems.
Another Guy - Although not a single, this was the first song released from 2013s ‘Where You Stand’. An insistent bass and drum propel the lo fi track whilst shimmering guitar effects hint at the influence of Bloc Party. Dreamy stuff.
Idlewild - This may be a crude comparison but this track makes me think of R.E.Ms ‘E-Bow the Letter’. Instead of Patti Smith, Fran Healy duets with Josephine Oniyama on this brooding low key shuffle. It is a standout from 2016s ‘Everything at Once’.
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