Music: The Man Who

The London-based Scottish rock band Travis makes music that sounds like the sound track to a troubled sleep. On this satisfying new album, its songs are gentle but insistent, melancholic but always melodious. At times the band comes off like a more polite, slightly less experimental version of the art-rock band Radiohead. Although the majority of the tracks on this CD–including the mellow Driftwood, the mopey Why Does It Always Rain on Me?–are quiet and introspective, Travis never comes across as wimpy or insubstantial.

–By Christopher John Farley