Travis with support from Ben Ottewell
at O2 Academy in Bournemouth, UK
words and photos by Phoebe Reeks

Travis returned to the O2 Academy in Bournemouth as part of their UK leg of tour celebrating 20 years of their third studio album, The Invisible Band.

Fans filled out the venue early to catch support act, singer-songwriter, Ben Ottewell, who performed several original songs, including ‘Shapes and Shadows’, as well as songs by his band, Gomez, including ‘Make No Noise’, setting the crowd up perfectly for the headliner to follow.

Travis opened the night with the first track and popular single release ‘Sing’, before reeling off the rest of the album, The Invisible Band in full. In between songs there was plenty of interaction with the audience, and little stories about the details behind each song. The band expressed their joy to share the celebration with everyone, especially after a difficult couple of years due to the pandemic, and thanked fans for listening to their music for the past few decades. It’s rare that you get to see an album played in the order it was released - amongst other light-hearted humour and chat with the audience throughout the night, frontman Fran Healy likened the gig to putting the album on at home and having the band walk into play live in your living room.

Fran Healy dedicated another popular single, ‘Flowers in the Window’ to Travis, celebrating how well they have done as a band. As they came towards the end of the first half of the set, the final song on the album ‘The Humpty Dumpty Love song’ was introduced, with a tribute to a good friend who passed away last year.

Picking the pace back up after a small interlude, Travis returned to stage to perform ‘A Ghost’ from the last album release 10 Songs and a selection of their greatest hits including ‘Driftwood’, ‘My Eyes’ and ‘Closer’, which had the crowd singing along loudly. The band closed the night with one of their most popular releases from 1999, ‘Why Does It Always Rain on Me’, a timeless classic which had the crowd singing and jumping alongside the band on stage.

Though it has been decades since they first started out, it is clear to see Travis are a band that aren’t stopping anytime soon, still enjoying what they do all these years later, smiling and joking on stage with each other, encouraging audience participation and offloading plenty of energy onstage.

TRAVIS: BOURNEMOUTH, UK - 18.05.22

BEN OTTEWELL

TRAVIS