DOUGIE Payne still remembers the critic’s response when Travis released their album The Man Who back in 1999.

“We got an absolute kicking,” he laughed. “I remember sitting in Fran’s house (lead singer Fran Healey) when it came out. We had all the papers and magazines and going through them one by one going ‘oh dear ... this is not good’.”

The Man Who was the follow-up to Travis’ debut album, Good Feeling, and with songs such as Driftwood and Why Does It Always Rain on Me?, it was a much more melodic, less rocky affair.

“We got a panning across the board,” said bassist Dougie. “I think the NME called it commercial suicide. It left us wondering what we should do.”

The band needn’t have worried. The Man Who spent 11 weeks at the top of the album charts and sold close to three million copies.

Now Travis are the latest band to delight fans by playing a classic album live in its entirety.

“In typically Travis getting it slightly wrong fashion we’re on the road with it 19 years after its release rather than waiting what’s become an industry standard 20 years,” said Dougie. “But we just felt it was a good time to do it.

“We’d finished touring our last album, Everything At Once, we were playing well and it just felt right to revisit the record.”

A number of the tracks from The Man Who have become mainstays of Travis’ live shows over the years which has meant the band have had to rethink their setlist this time round.

“We have got used to playing these keystones at the end over the years; we’ve played them all by song seven on this tour,” said Dougie. “But that’s been good for us. We’ve had to revisit the back catalogue and had to rejig the second half of the set which actually has been really nice.

“In terms of the big songs from the album, it takes them back to being just songs rather than events in the set. All songs start as something very small but some go on to be these things that you stop to regard as a song. It’s quite nice to play Why Does It Always Rain On Me? early on as just another one of our songs.”

The tour has also given the band the chance to play some songs from the album which are rarities in their live set.

“I don’t think that She’s So Strange has ever been played live before this year and songs like Luv and The Last Laugh of Laughter have only got played very rarely since the original Man Who tour,” he said. “It’s nice to have them back even though we did have to a little bit of re-learning to get them ready for the tour.”

Travis will come to Manchester on what is the second leg of the album tour.

“We’re hitting the spots we missed on the first pass,” he said. “What’s nice is that it’s an album which works being played live. The running order works as a live experience.”

Particularly given its harsh reception, the band never expected The Man Who to be as successful as it has been but they always knew they had a good album.

“It still sounds fresh today,” said Dougie. “Fran as a songwriter was going through a real purple patch at the time and there’s an emotional honesty to the songs which doesn’t date.

“But for an album to be so successful is all about luck really.

“When it came out the Britpop party had ended and everybody was ready for a soundtrack to the hangover.”

Travis, the Man Who Live, Manchester Apollo, Wednesday, December 19. Details from www.gigsandtours.com