SOME bands are timeless, others define their era, and these achieved longevity by having no discernible sound or image to either love or hate.
Keane
Keane are basically a fluke who had one of the UK’s best-selling albums off the back of two songs you can hum but not fully remember. Their hiatus went largely unnoticed and they haven’t exactly been high-profile of late, so you’ll be surprised to learn they’re playing Glastonbury this year. Then again they’ll be forgotten as quickly as the Dua Lipa set dads have been horny for all year, and just not because everyone’s drunk.
Travis
Soft rock is a nice way of describing dross and Travis were leading purveyors of it once. There was the excitement of an octopus getting thrown on someone in the video for Sing, which ironically it’s hard to remember the tune to. Meanwhile their big hit about being stuck in rainy doldrums took characterlessness to new levels. Appropriately, it was inspired by a holiday where it – you’ll never guess – rained all the time. Genius.
Athlete
Most people don’t know Athlete, a name presumably chosen because it was the first word they saw in a dictionary that was useable, unlike ‘abaciscus’ or ‘attributively’. Their only real song Wires was a top ten hit, and had the dubious honour of being sung by Rylan on The X Factor, leading to a strange impromptu performance later where Olly Murs clicked his fingers and Caroline Flack swayed along to a song about a baby in intensive care. Athlete didn’t fade out until a decade later, when their bassist started the equally inspiringly-named project ‘Boxes’.
Goo Goo Dolls
This duo is like a piece of old furniture relegated to the attic, brought out occasionally then returned after remembering all it does is take up space. Iris is a can’t-quite-place-it anthem that was described as ‘ubiquitous’ more for its unavoidable nature than universal appeal. If only singer Robby Takac’s signature look, resembling a teenage girl rebelling against her parents by dying her hair, translated to their songwriting, but that remains totally forgettable, of course.
Stereophonics
So bland are Stereophonics that they occupy not one, but two, liminal spaces: the Welsh Valleys and the genre of post-Britpop, when we’d all had enough of mockneys and miserable feuding bastards and guitars. However after a few albums by Kelly Jones and the gang, the whole country was probably clamouring for Liam to get back on the tambourine and/or tell Damon to get AIDS. But while those other bands gradually went their own ways, Stereophonics are still around. Of course they are.
Snow Patrol
Even after releasing one the most played songs of its decade, no one can picture a member of Snow Patrol. Boldly breaking the tradition of personality-lacking bands having just one word to their name, Snow Patrol were initially called Polar Bear, if you’re taking part in the world’s most boring pub trivia quiz. They also wackily released an EP named after yoghurt. Luckily the success of Chasing Cars, a rubbish void of a song, gave them enough money to keep going. And lucky us.
