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Track List
01) Writing to Reach You
02) The Fear
03) As You Are
04) Driftwood 
05) The Last Laugh of the Laughter
06) Turn
07) Why Does It Always Rain on Me
08) Luv
09) She's So Strange
10) Slide Show
11) Blue Flashing Light
01) Writing to Reach You
02) The Fear
03) As You Are
04) Driftwood
05) The Last Laugh of the Laughter
06) Turn
07) Why Does It Always Rain on Me
08) Luv
09) She's So Strange
10) Slide Show
11) Blue Flashing Light
3:41
4:12
4:14
3:33
4:20
4:23
4:25
4:54
3:15
3:53
5:32
Data Complete
80%
Total Rating
80%Total Rating
(2 users)
Back Cover
CD Art
3D Case
3D Thumb
3D Flat
3D Face
3D Spine
First Released
1999
Rock
Reflective
Rock/Pop
---
Medium
Album
2,700,000 copies
Album Description
Available in:
The Man Who is the second studio album from the Scottish indie pop band Travis. The album was released on 24 May 1999, becoming the album that gave the band international recognition.
Travis' second album, The Man Who, was produced by Nigel Godrich and recorded at producer Mike Hedges' chateau in France. The band continued recording at, among other studios, Abbey Road Studios in London. The Man Who initially looked as though it would mirror the release of Good Feeling. Although it entered the charts at No. 7, with little radio play of its singles, it quickly slipped down. Worse, many critics who had raved about the rocky Good Feeling rubbished the album for the band's move into more melodic, melancholic material (for example, "Travis will be best when they stop trying to make sad, classic records" - NME). However, when the album slipped as far as No. 19, it stopped. Word of mouth and increasing radio play of the single "Why Does It Always Rain on Me?" increased awareness of the band and the album began to rise back up the charts. Then, when Travis took the stage to perform this song at the 1999 Glastonbury Festival, after being dry for several hours, it began to rain as soon as the first line was sung. The following day the story was all over the papers and television, and with word of mouth and increased radio play of this and the album's other singles, The Man Who rose to No. 1 on the British charts.
It also eventually took Best Album at the 2000 BRIT Awards, with Travis being named Best Band. Music industry magazine Music Week awarded them the same honours, while at the Ivor Novello Awards, Travis took the Best Songwriter(s) and Best Contemporary Song Awards. Travis followed the release of The Man Who with an extensive 237-gig world tour, including headlining the 2000 Glastonbury, T in the Park and V Festivals, and a US tour leg with Oasis. In Los Angeles, an appearance of the band at an in-store signing forced police to close Sunset Strip. The gentle, melodic approach of The Man Who became a hallmark of the latter-day Britpop sound, and inspired a new wave of UK-based rock bands, with acts such as Coldplay and Starsailor soon joining Travis in challenging the chart dominance of urban and dance acts. The title "The Man Who" comes from the book The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat by neurologist Oliver Sacks. The majority of songs for this album were written before Good Feeling was even released. "Writing to Reach You", "The Fear" and "Luv" being penned around 1995/96, with "As You Are", "Turn" and "She's So Strange" dating back as far as 1993 and the early Glass Onion EP.
User Album Review
A cavalcade of keening, copper-bottomed pop melodies.
Glasgow’s Travis emerged in the late 90s, along with a tranche of fellow travellers in melodic, post-Britpop guitar music including Cast, Embrace and Doves. Released in the spring of 1999, The Man Who was the band’s second, and breakthrough, album. It berthed no fewer than five hit singles and would temporarily elevate the quartet, fronted by twinkle-eyed, stentorian voiced Fran Healy, to UK pop’s high table.
Although they’d originally based their sound on Oasis’s anthemic blueprint ”“ albeit minus Liam Gallagher’s feral menace and with added undergraduate cuteness ”“ Travis’s sophomore album (its title derived from Oliver Sacks’ popular psychology book, The Man Who Mistook his Wife For a Hat) proffered an airier signature, with glinting electric guitars, strummed acoustics and a procession of undemanding, mid-paced tempos. Characterised by uncomplicated, sing-along choruses, this was 90s ‘alternative’ music scrubbed, buffed and, frankly, neutered, for mainstream consumption.
As perky and uplifting as it was musically unchallenging, for all its sonic predictability, The Man Who couldn’t be faulted for its cavalcade of keening, copper-bottomed pop melodies. Its standout track, Why Does It Always Rain on Me, a UK top ten single, was an everyday hymn to getting it in the neck from karma, pivoting on an almost childishly simple, yet unshakeably infectious chorus; its ‘why me?’ sentiment something every listener could relate to. The similarly accessible Writing to Reach You and Driftwood added just a pinch of minor chord ache to the formula, while the chiming, lilting, Turn sought to express human irrepressibility in a gush of banal platitudes of the “I want to live in a world where I belong” variety.
The album would go on to sell close to three million copies, which, if nothing else, demonstrates how far an a inane lyric, an ingenuous melody and a boyish frontman grin will go. As inoffensive as it was, the album did offer one note of conceit: a sleeve dedication to the late, maverick movie director Stanley Kubrick. But an association with something as unerringly orthodox and formulaic as The Man Who would surely see the famously envelope-stretching filmmaker ‘turn’ in his grave.
External Album Reviews
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User Comments
Available in:
The Man Who is the second studio album from the Scottish indie pop band Travis. The album was released on 24 May 1999, becoming the album that gave the band international recognition.
Travis' second album, The Man Who, was produced by Nigel Godrich and recorded at producer Mike Hedges' chateau in France. The band continued recording at, among other studios, Abbey Road Studios in London. The Man Who initially looked as though it would mirror the release of Good Feeling. Although it entered the charts at No. 7, with little radio play of its singles, it quickly slipped down. Worse, many critics who had raved about the rocky Good Feeling rubbished the album for the band's move into more melodic, melancholic material (for example, "Travis will be best when they stop trying to make sad, classic records" - NME). However, when the album slipped as far as No. 19, it stopped. Word of mouth and increasing radio play of the single "Why Does It Always Rain on Me?" increased awareness of the band and the album began to rise back up the charts. Then, when Travis took the stage to perform this song at the 1999 Glastonbury Festival, after being dry for several hours, it began to rain as soon as the first line was sung. The following day the story was all over the papers and television, and with word of mouth and increased radio play of this and the album's other singles, The Man Who rose to No. 1 on the British charts.
It also eventually took Best Album at the 2000 BRIT Awards, with Travis being named Best Band. Music industry magazine Music Week awarded them the same honours, while at the Ivor Novello Awards, Travis took the Best Songwriter(s) and Best Contemporary Song Awards. Travis followed the release of The Man Who with an extensive 237-gig world tour, including headlining the 2000 Glastonbury, T in the Park and V Festivals, and a US tour leg with Oasis. In Los Angeles, an appearance of the band at an in-store signing forced police to close Sunset Strip. The gentle, melodic approach of The Man Who became a hallmark of the latter-day Britpop sound, and inspired a new wave of UK-based rock bands, with acts such as Coldplay and Starsailor soon joining Travis in challenging the chart dominance of urban and dance acts. The title "The Man Who" comes from the book The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat by neurologist Oliver Sacks. The majority of songs for this album were written before Good Feeling was even released. "Writing to Reach You", "The Fear" and "Luv" being penned around 1995/96, with "As You Are", "Turn" and "She's So Strange" dating back as far as 1993 and the early Glass Onion EP.
User Album Review
A cavalcade of keening, copper-bottomed pop melodies.
Glasgow’s Travis emerged in the late 90s, along with a tranche of fellow travellers in melodic, post-Britpop guitar music including Cast, Embrace and Doves. Released in the spring of 1999, The Man Who was the band’s second, and breakthrough, album. It berthed no fewer than five hit singles and would temporarily elevate the quartet, fronted by twinkle-eyed, stentorian voiced Fran Healy, to UK pop’s high table.
Although they’d originally based their sound on Oasis’s anthemic blueprint ”“ albeit minus Liam Gallagher’s feral menace and with added undergraduate cuteness ”“ Travis’s sophomore album (its title derived from Oliver Sacks’ popular psychology book, The Man Who Mistook his Wife For a Hat) proffered an airier signature, with glinting electric guitars, strummed acoustics and a procession of undemanding, mid-paced tempos. Characterised by uncomplicated, sing-along choruses, this was 90s ‘alternative’ music scrubbed, buffed and, frankly, neutered, for mainstream consumption.
As perky and uplifting as it was musically unchallenging, for all its sonic predictability, The Man Who couldn’t be faulted for its cavalcade of keening, copper-bottomed pop melodies. Its standout track, Why Does It Always Rain on Me, a UK top ten single, was an everyday hymn to getting it in the neck from karma, pivoting on an almost childishly simple, yet unshakeably infectious chorus; its ‘why me?’ sentiment something every listener could relate to. The similarly accessible Writing to Reach You and Driftwood added just a pinch of minor chord ache to the formula, while the chiming, lilting, Turn sought to express human irrepressibility in a gush of banal platitudes of the “I want to live in a world where I belong” variety.
The album would go on to sell close to three million copies, which, if nothing else, demonstrates how far an a inane lyric, an ingenuous melody and a boyish frontman grin will go. As inoffensive as it was, the album did offer one note of conceit: a sleeve dedication to the late, maverick movie director Stanley Kubrick. But an association with something as unerringly orthodox and formulaic as The Man Who would surely see the famously envelope-stretching filmmaker ‘turn’ in his grave.
External Album Reviews
None...
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