I like "Writing to reach you" by Travis.

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There. Flummoxed by the strength of feeling about Mag Fields, i just thought I'd toss this one to the lions instead. Travis have written at least one really good song, and a couple of OK ones. discuss.

― Alan at home, Tuesday, 30 October 2001 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

(That should be the strength of *negative* feeling.)

― Alan at home, Tuesday, 30 October 2001 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

I've never heard "Writing To Reach You". Everything I've heard by Travis I've disliked.

― Tom, Tuesday, 30 October 2001 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Sure, they have quite a few pretty songs. So they sound like a lightweight Radiohead/Oasis, that doesn't really bother me. I wouldn't mind hearing them on the radio every so often. I suspect if I lived in the UK my feelings about Travis would be much more negative, though.

― Arthur, Tuesday, 30 October 2001 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

if only they were not such dull/nice people that write objectively proper songs. I just watched a Ramones bootleg of Teenage Lobotomy, and they were terrible, but in the immortal words of Wesley Willis, They Rocked A Bull Elk's Ass.

why is it that the best rock stars are always the people that you would not actually want to be friends with in real life? Sting in 1982, Iggy Pop in 1972, John Lydon in 1976, Morrissey in 1986...

― Michael Taylor, Tuesday, 30 October 2001 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

I've never disliked a Travis song, but I've only heard like two. Sappy MOR ought to at least have melodies, which is something much of the VH-1 crowd (Train, Vertical Horizon Wireless, etc) seems not to have discovered yet. I think I like Travis about as much as I like Staind.

― Kris, Tuesday, 30 October 2001 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Yeah good song but one I haven't heard enough of to pick up the lyrics or most of the melody....just the hook "dada dada reach you"bit ..frustrating when this is all you can sing... if you know the rest of that lyric please enlightn

― FLeet, Tuesday, 30 October 2001 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

Same chords in the same key as 'Wonderwall'. No wonder it's comforting.

― Snotty Moore, Tuesday, 30 October 2001 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

I quite like that album The Man Who. And I do think saturated airplay might be the reason for so many Travis haters in the U.K. On the other hand the singles I've heard for the Invisible Band have done nothing for me. They do better with sad songs, I think.

― bnw, Tuesday, 30 October 2001 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

"Writing To Reach You" and "Driftwood". And after that they became the friggin' Monkees. Sad.

― Alacrán, Tuesday, 30 October 2001 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

The Monkees piss all over Travis 'cos they didn't write their own songs!

― Andrew L, Wednesday, 31 October 2001 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

pleasant valley sunday is better than any travis song to date, so this is no insult. then again that's a goffin-king song, no?

― Alan Trewartha, Wednesday, 31 October 2001 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

I like 'Writing To Reach You' as well. More than 'Wonderwall' anyway. I also like 'Coming Around' and 'Sing'. 'Driftwood' and everything else I've heard by them has been wretched. Have you ever borne witness to Fran Healey introducing 'Driftwood' live?

"I don't know about you, but when I was a kid I used to play pooh-sticks on the bridge. And y'know that got me thinking about how uninhibited we are when we're young and how sad it is that we grow up and our minds get all closed off and we're scared to play those games anymoew. So I wrote a song about those feelings. It's called Driftwood." Cue Audience: "YEAAAHHHHH!'. Cue Me: 'I want to kill you'.

― Nick, Wednesday, 31 October 2001 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

"sing" lyrics suspected of piss-poor rhyming:

all the love you bring

won't meeeeeeeean a thing

unless you sing (sing sing sing)

reminds me of "sometimes the snow comes down in june, sometimes the sun goes round the moon" by someone i really don't care to be reminded of

― Alan Trewartha, Wednesday, 31 October 2001 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

I like it too. I don't own it, but I would like to. I like the sound of the band when they come on the radio. They sound very different from other contemporary rockers (nothing like S-phonics or R-head, for instance). I like their sound. What I really don't like about them is their name.

― the pinefox, Wednesday, 31 October 2001 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

I like their sound too, Piney. Sitting in the Palace Cafe eating Set Breakfast #4 listening to that mellifluous, glowing opening to "Sing" on Heart FM (or whatever that station is) is one of my more pleasant memories from this last summer of idleness.

Mind you, Barbra S's "Woman In Love" struck me as a fabulously constructed bit of fluff in the same location the other week. I think they put pentobarbital in the veggie sausages.

― Michael Jones, Wednesday, 31 October 2001 01:00 (twenty-three years ago)

four years pass...

I still like it, though maybe it excites me less than it did 4 years ago.

― the pinefox, Saturday, 26 November 2005 14:23 (nineteen years ago)

i can't imagine a travis record "exciting" anyone!

(except perhaps "U16 Girls" which might excite G4ry Gl1tter)

― CharlieNo4 (Charlie), Saturday, 26 November 2005 14:25 (nineteen years ago)

Most of the songs on "The Man Who" and "The Invisible Band" were ace.

― Geir Hongro (GeirHong), Saturday, 26 November 2005 15:30 (nineteen years ago)

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