The first incarnation of Travis formed in the early 1990s when singer Fran Healey met guitarist Andy Dunlop at art college in Glasgow. Teaming up with their local barman Neil Primrose on drums, they immediately displayed their Beatles influence by naming the band after the White Album track Glass Onion.

Things started to take off in the summer of 1996 when Fran and Andy's college friend Dougie Payne came aboard on bass and the band relocated to London, sharing a house together in true Monkees style. Whilst there, they adopted the name Travis¹ and scraped together enough money to finance a debut single, All I Want To Do Is Rock, which became the NME's Single of the Week and caught the attention of record label boss Andy McDonald.

McDonald signed the band to his Independiente label and released a second single, U16 Girls, in March 1997. The single crept into the bottom position of the top forty and paved the way for a top ten album, Good Feeling, and a series of increasingly successful singles, including a revamped version of their self-financed debut, throughout 1997 and into 1998.

After a prolonged silence, the band returned with a second album, The Man Who, in 1999. Perhaps conscious of the fact that the biggest hit from Good Feeling had been the ballad More Than Us, the singles from The Man Who forsook the noisy approach of Travis' early singles in favour of lots of acoustic strumming. The shift in style paid off, as Writing To Reach You and Driftwood continued the band's run of increasing success, but Travis' break into the big time can be traced directly to their appearance at the 1999 Glastonbury festival, as the mud-splattered revellers adopted the band's Why Does It Always Rain On Me? as the event's anthem. The song subsequently became Travis' first top ten hit, and propelled The Man Who to the top of the album chart.

Since then, the band has continued to improve its chart positions with each release. Turn hit number 8 in November 1999, helped by the inclusion of Travis' very mellow interpretation of Britney Spears' Baby One More Time, while their only release of 2000, the Teenage Fanclub soundalike single Coming Around, reached number 3. With a new album scheduled for 2001, Travis' success should continue to grow for some time to come.

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