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Nick Low, producer of the Janice Forsyth show shares with us some early recordings by Fran Healy.

Fran Healy is a charming man who has written a hit song or three for his band Travis. As the producer of the Janice Forsyth Show I was delighted to see that he had a new solo album "Wreckorder" out and had agreed to come on Janice's show for a chat and perform a couple of acoustic tracks.

Janice Forsyth with Fran Healy

Now, Janice and myself have a bit of history with Fran when he was with his first band Glass Onion back in the early 90's. Janice used to present the programme NB along with Radio Scotland's "Get It On" supremo Bryan Burnett, and after seeing an early Glass Onion gig at (and particularly impressed at the enthusiastic response by one audience member - Fran's mum!) she fought to get Glass Onion on the programme. Fran was remarking how the subsequent had recently resurfaced thanks to youtube.

In 1992, Glass Onion won a Ö÷²¥´óÐã Radio Scotland "Battle Of The Bands" type competition on Ö÷²¥´óÐã Radio Scotland's Dougie Campbell Show and the prize was a Radio Scotland session; the band's first ever radio session. Glass Onion, led by Fran and with a groovy organ sound came in and recorded 4 songs, one of which was "Safe" which I remember being a difficult one to mix. Some years later, Fran admitted when I interviewed him for a Radio 2 documentary on the band that Travis had struggled to get "Safe" right and it took nearly 10 years for it to turn up in a more polished form on their third album "The Invisible Band". None of the other three tracks ever appeared again. Here are two of the Glass Onion session recordings which was Fran's first ever Ö÷²¥´óÐã session and you can compare that with his latest, 18 years later, for the Janice Forsyth Show. I think the bones of what makes Fran Healy a great songwriter has always been there - have a listen."

Nick Low, producer The Janice Forsyth Show
Fran Healy in session 18th September 2010, 10:00-12:00