Music

Travis taps into the coolest of the uncool

“This is a Travis concert,” frontman Fran Healy said at last night’s Webster Hall gig. “You check your cool at the door.”

But then, that’s always been the appeal of the band’s shows. It’s about goofy fun, without any of the usual rock posturing or pretense.

And the carefree attitude starts with Healy, who arrived on stage wearing a fedora and a black Travis T-shirt. What other rock star so completely lacks vanity that he forgoes a stylist in favor of just raiding his own merch table?

And what other rock star burns most of his between-song banter lovingly talking about his kids? Healy revealed that “Reminder,” off the new album “Where You Stand,” was meant as a list of rules for his boy, including the commandments to “don’t be late” and “finish what’s on your plate.”

Can’t picture Mick Jagger doing the same, and not just because he’s probably not even sure how many kids he has.

On “Flowers in the Window,” Healy strapped on an acoustic, threw his hands in the air and let bass player Dougie Payne strum while lead guitarist Andy Dunlop fingered the chords on the fretboard.

On “Good Feeling,” off the Scottish band’s 1997 debut, Dunlop jumped into the middle of the audience, stretching some 30 feet of cable behind him.

“Where You Stand” marks the band’s first release in five years (Healy said the group members were off spending time with their kids), and the band sprinkled a liberal number of new songs throughout the set list, including “Moving” and the melodic title track.

But it was the classics that found the crowd singing along the loudest, such as “Turn” and the closer, “Why Does It Always Rain on Me?”

If you missed it, you can still catch a glimpse. After the show officially wrapped, Healy and the boys ran through “Mother” a handful of times to film a video.