The less than best of British

By RUSSELL BAILLIE

There was a time - as captured by the new film documentary Live Forever - when Britrock seemed to be on a world-conquering roll.

Then the leading lights started wilting, or reinventing themselves.

Now fans have that inevitably difficult next Radiohead album, the comforting tones of Coldplay, the worrying prospect of a new Oasis album and that's about it.

Which must make it even harder for life in the second division, as these three bands on their fourth (Travis), third (Muse) and second (Starsailor) albums respectively.

Scotland's Travis' big breakthrough was on their second, The Man Who, with its melancholy heart-on-sleeve anthems. The new one, Twelve Memories, feels - as did their previous The Invisible Band - a continuing reaction to what made them successful.

They've scaled down the sound, buried the hooks a little, left songs under- rather than overproduced. Fran Healy still delivers ballads on which his bittersweet lyrics give an edge to their acoustic guitar or piano-driven gentleness - at best here on the lush Re-Offender, the lilting Somewhere Else and Paperclips with an off-kilter arrangement suggesting Tom Waits had been around to lend a hand.

The big bad world comes in for Healy's attentions too, on a few protest songs of wry sarcasm. The Beautiful Occupation which suggests REM and the Beach Boys holding up the ends of an anti-war banner outside Tony Blair's place. The Beatlesque Peace the **** Out with its football-terrace singalong outro reminds that no one can swear with more charm than the Scottish.

It does have a few too many songs which inspire a reaction of forgettable niceness. And apart from those occasional odd noises, it's no great leap anywhere in particular in terms of the band's musical approach. But Healy remains an engaging singer - who thankfully seems to have turned down the falsetto - and there's no mistaking the simple, thoughtful charm and humour of his best songs. No world-beater, but a good Travis album.

On the other hand, Devon trio Muse would seem to be getting even more overwrought by the album, with the overall effect still being Radiohead delivering a tribute collection of Queen's more pompous B-sides. It strives for something majestic, profound, life-changing with musical ambitions far loftier than any of their contemporaries - as well as an adept guitarist, frontman Matt Bellamy does like to show off his classical abilities on the ivories at every opportunity.

But boy, it does go on a bit and Bellamy's lyrics and tortured delivery remain fine examples of Gothrock.101 especially on the end-is-nigh openers of Apocalypse Please and Time Is Running Out.

Prize for the most laughably overblown tracks, though, are a tie between the operatic metal into synthesizer symphony with choral extras of Stockholm Syndrome and Falling Away With You which after a gentle start that sounds like it once belonged to Dire Straits heads also comes down with an attack of florid arpeggiation and Bellamy's voice trying to find a high note he likes.

The more he emotes, the more tedious it gets. Again, Muse prove they're a band apart with their alleged grand vision. But that doesn't make them any good.

Starsailor is another English band whose singer James Walsh- under the influence of the late Jeff Buckley and Radiohead's Thom Yorke - is given to sounding like an earnest choirboy.

That was just the quality that attracted quite a few buyers to their 2001 debut Love is Here and one Phil Spector, who initially signed on as producer - before the trouble with the dead woman in his lobby. It didn't work with crazy Phil, and he was given the heave-ho and now only two tracks - the title track and the White Dove - are credited to him from those abandoned sessions.

Both are forgettable, even with their hint of Spector's classic sound. So too unfortunately are the balance of the tracks - not because of patchy production but lacklustre songwriting combined with Walsh's singing style

It starts off promisingly on the rousing Music Was Saved and the momentum is sustained a little by that equally toe-tapping title track.

But so much of the rest falls into a dull rut - albeit a lush, elegant-sounding one, especially on the orchestra-backed Telling Them.

Walsh's voice sings every banal hippy-damaged lyric as if it's great poetry. Spector undoubtedly recognised Starsailor's gift for the melodramatic. But here any other ability is in little evidence.

Travis:12 Memories

(Herald rating: * * * *)

Label: Independiente


Muse: Absolution

(Herald rating: * *)

Label: Taste Media/FMR

Starsailor: Silence is Easy

(Herald rating: * *)

Label: EMI