Song · Travis
“Why Does It Always Rain on Me?” by Travis
“Why Does It Always Rain on Me?” by Travis appears on 23 radio countdowns from 15 stations between 1999 and 2025. Its best result is #1 on the Virgin Radio Top 10 Songs of 1999. In the combined RockLists rankings it is the #95 alternative song of 2000 and #2,428 alternative song of all time.
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Fran Healy went to Israel hunting for winter sunshine and got rain for the whole holiday, and the Travis frontman turned that washout into "Why Does It Always Rain on Me?". It became the third single from the band's second album, The Man Who, following "Writing to Reach You" and "Driftwood" onto Independiente in August 1999. Mike Hedges produced it, with sessions at the Chateau de la Rouge Motte in Domfront en Poiraie and at Abbey Road in London.
It's post-Britpop at its most gloriously glum, a sigh of a tune that makes feeling hard done by sound almost cozy. Songwriting Magazine counts it as the Scottish band's breakthrough: it climbed to number four in Scotland and 10 in the UK and made the top 20 in Australia, and Absolute Radio listeners voted it 62nd among the best songs of the 1990s.
Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.
RockLists rankings
Alternative & Modern Rock
Indie & Adult Alternative
All Rock Formats
Year-end countdowns
| Year | # | Station | Countdown | of |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1999 | 1 | Virgin Radio United Kingdom | Virgin Radio Top 10 Songs of 1999 | 10 |
| 2000 | 91 | KROQ Los Angeles, CA | KROQ Top 106.7 Songs of 2000 | 107 |
| 2000 | 91 | 91X San Diego, CA / Tijuana | 91X Top 91 Songs of 2000 | 91 |
| 2000 | 89 | Q101 Chicago, IL | Q101 Top 101 Songs of 2000 | 101 |
| 2000 | 72 | WHFS Washington, DC / Baltimore, MD | WHFS Top 99.1 Songs of 2000 | 100 |
| 2000 | 61 | WFNX Boston, MA | WFNX Top 100 Songs of 2000 | 100 |
| 2000 | 71 | 107.7 The End Seattle, WA | The End Top 107 Songs of 2000 | 107 |
| 2000 | 87 | The Buzz Burlington, VT / Plattsburgh, NY / Montreal, QC | The Buzz Top 99 Songs of 2000 | 99 |
| 2000 | 84 | 102.7 WEQX Southern Vermont and the Capital District of New York (Albany) | WEQX Top 102.7 of 2000 | 102 |
| 2000 | 31 | Triple J Australia (national) | Triple J Hottest 100 of 2000 | 100 |
All-time and decade countdowns
| Year | # | Station | Countdown | of |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2001 | 18 | Virgin Radio | Virgin Radio Top 500 Songs of All-Time (December 2001) | 500 |
| 2003 | 5 | Virgin Radio | Virgin Radio VR10x10 (April 2003) | 100 |
| 2004 | 150 | Virgin Radio | Virgin Radio Top 500 Songs of All-Time (December 2004) | 500 |
| 2005 | 523 | 99X | 99X Freedom of Choice 1000 (2005) | 1000 |
| 2005 | 284 | Virgin Radio | Virgin Radio Top 500 Songs of All-Time (December 2005) | 500 |
| 2006 | 134 | Virgin Radio | Virgin Radio Top 500 Songs of All-Time (December 2006) | 500 |
| 2007 | 1992 | CD101 | CD101 Top 2008 Songs of All-Time (December 2007) | 2008 |
| 2008 | 1946 | CD101 | CD101 Top 2009 Songs of All-Time (December 2008) | 2009 |
| 2009 | 1908 | CD101 | CD101 Top 2010 Songs of All-Time (December 2009) | 2010 |
| 2009 | 628 | WYEP | WYEP 913 Essential Songs | 913 |
| 2010 | 1964 | CD101 | CD101 Top 2011 Songs of All-Time (December 2010) | 2011 |
| 2022 | 500 | The Colorado Sound | The Colorado Sound Top 900 Songs of the '90s | 900 |
| 2025 | 270 | WFPK | WFPK Top 500 Songs of the '90s | 500 |
Also listed as: Why Does it Always Rain on Me; Why Does It Always Rain On Me?; Why Does It Always Rain on Me; Why Does it Always Rain on Me?; Why Does It Always Rain On Me.
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