Travis hopes to lift New York spirit

Pop group Travis today said they were hoping to bring ‘‘some relief’’ to New York when they play in the city this week.

The band, which has topped the album charts with The Man Who and The Invisible Band, is due to play in the city’s famous Radio City Music Hall on Tuesday as the opening performance in a tour of America.

Today frontman Fran Healy said the band had been anxious about coming to the city in the wake of the September 11 terror attacks but had decided to go ahead.

‘‘People are saying ‘We need some relief’,’’ he said.

And he said the opening song on their new album, Sing, would be one of the spirit-lifting tunes they will play.

‘‘That song has caught people’s imagination,’’ he said.

‘‘Like laughing and crying, singing’s a very basic human function. The appealing thing about singing is, it’s a release.’’

Healy admitted his mother had been worried about the band crossing the Atlantic in the wake of the attacks, but he wanted to find out how the terrorist murders had affected the country.

The band are due to play in 19 cities, their biggest solo tour of the United States so far, which comes after they supported Oasis in their American tour last year and were hailed by critics as better than the Manchester band.

Healy said the attacks would not affect how the band played.

‘‘You play as hard as you can and sing to every person in the room,’’ he said.

But he admitted his mental focus, and the rest of the band’s, had not been on music, but the World Trade Centre and Pentagon attacks.

‘‘it is so terrible. It doesn’t seem real,’’ he said.