"Dear Mr. Fantasy" | |
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Song by Traffic | |
from the album Mr. Fantasy | |
Released |
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Genre | Blues rock, psychedelic rock |
Length | 5:44 |
Label |
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Composer(s) | |
Lyricist(s) | Jim Capaldi |
Producer(s) | Jimmy Miller |
Music video | |
"Dear Mr. Fantasy" (audio) on YouTube |
"Dear Mr. Fantasy" is a rock song by Traffic from their 1967 album, Mr. Fantasy . Jim Capaldi contributed the lyrics, while Steve Winwood and Chris Wood composed the music. [1]
In a song review for AllMusic, Lindsay Planer writes:
A slightly trippy dark and foreboding tone permeates both the lyrics and arrangement contrasting the rock-solid pop delivery. Tying it all together are Winwood’s emotive and residually mournful lyrics. With a distinct blue-eyed soul intonation –perfected during a seminal stint in the Spencer Davis Group –he effortlessly increases the drama with a combination of slightly behind the beat timing and empathic vocals. [2]
Dave Matthews mentioned this song specifically as part of his speech inducting Traffic into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and this is the song they played as part of that same induction. [3]
Traffic recorded an extended version (10:57) for their live album Welcome to the Canteen (1971). [4] Winwood played the song at Eric Clapton's 2007 Crossroads Guitar Festival and the song appears on the festival DVD. Winwood and Clapton played the song on their joint tour; a live recording appears on the album Live from Madison Square Garden (2009). [5] Planer also notes performances by Mike Bloomfield and Al Kooper (1969, The Live Adventures of Mike Bloomfield and Al Kooper ); the Grateful Dead (1980s–1990s), and Crosby, Stills, & Nash (1991, CSN box set). [2]
A supergroup is a musical group formed of members who are already successful as solo artists or as members of other successful groups. The term became popular in the late 1960s when members of already successful rock groups recorded albums together, after which they normally disbanded. Charity supergroups, in which prominent musicians perform or record together in support of a particular cause, have been common since the 1980s. The term is most common in the context of rock and pop music, but it has occasionally been applied to other musical genres. For example, opera superstars the Three Tenors and hip hop duos Kids See Ghosts and Bad Meets Evil all have been called supergroups.
Traffic were an English rock band formed in Birmingham in April 1967 by Steve Winwood, Jim Capaldi, Chris Wood and Dave Mason. They began as a psychedelic rock group and diversified their sound through the use of instruments such as keyboards, sitar, and various reed instruments, and by incorporating jazz and improvisational techniques in their music.
Blind Faith were an English rock supergroup that consisted of Steve Winwood, Eric Clapton, Ginger Baker, and Ric Grech. They followed the success of each of the member's former bands, including Clapton and Baker's former group Cream and Winwood's former group Traffic, but they split after a few months, producing only one album and a three-month summer tour.
Stephen Lawrence Winwood is an English musician and songwriter whose genres include blue-eyed soul, rhythm and blues, blues rock and pop rock. Though primarily a guitarist, keyboard player and vocalist, prominent for his distinctive soulful high tenor voice, Winwood plays other instruments proficiently, including drums, mandolin, bass and saxophone.
Nicola James Capaldi was an English singer-songwriter and drummer. His musical career spanned more than four decades. He co-founded the progressive rock band Traffic in 1967 with Steve Winwood with whom he co-wrote the majority of the band's material. He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a part of Traffic's original lineup.
Al Kooper is a retired American songwriter, record producer, and musician, known for joining and naming Blood, Sweat & Tears, although he did not stay with the group long enough to share its popularity. Throughout much of the 1960s and 1970s he was a prolific studio musician, including playing organ on the Bob Dylan song "Like a Rolling Stone", French horn and piano on the Rolling Stones song "You Can't Always Get What You Want", and lead guitar on Rita Coolidge's "The Lady's Not for Sale". Kooper produced a number of one-off collaboration albums, such as the Super Session album that saw him work separately with guitarists Mike Bloomfield and Stephen Stills. In the 1970s Kooper was a successful manager and producer, recording Lynyrd Skynyrd's first three albums. He has had a successful solo career, writing music for film soundtracks, and has lectured in musical composition. Kooper was selected for induction for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2023.
David Thomas Mason is an English singer-songwriter and guitarist from Worcester, who first found fame with the rock band Traffic, and went on to play and record with many notable pop and rock musicians, including Paul McCartney, George Harrison, the Rolling Stones, Jimi Hendrix, Eric Clapton, Michael Jackson, David Crosby, Graham Nash, Steve Winwood, Fleetwood Mac, Delaney & Bonnie, Leon Russell, and Cass Elliot.
Mr. Fantasy is the debut album by English rock band Traffic, released in December 1967. The recording included group members Jim Capaldi, Steve Winwood, Chris Wood, and Dave Mason; Mason temporarily left the band shortly after the album was released. The album reached the number 16 position in the UK Albums Chart, and number 88 on the Billboard Top LPs chart in the United States.
Eric Clapton's Rainbow Concert is a live album by Eric Clapton, recorded at the Rainbow Theatre in London on 13 January 1973 and released in September that year. The concerts, two on the same evening, were organised by Pete Townshend of the Who and marked a comeback by Clapton after two years of inactivity, broken only by his performance at the Concert for Bangladesh in August 1971. Along with Townshend, the musicians supporting Clapton include Steve Winwood, Ronnie Wood and Jim Capaldi. In the year following the two shows at the Rainbow, Clapton recovered from his heroin addiction and recorded 461 Ocean Boulevard (1974).
Anthony "Rebop" Kwaku Baah was a Ghanaian percussionist who worked with the 1970s rock groups Traffic and Can.
Welcome to the Canteen is the first live album by English rock band Traffic. It was recorded live at Fairfield Halls, Croydon and the Oz Benefit Concert in the canteen of the Polytechnic of Central London London, on 3 July 1971 and released in September of that year. It was recorded during Dave Mason's third stint with the band, which lasted only six performances.
The Finer Things is a compilation album box set of recordings by Steve Winwood. It includes songs from his early days with The Spencer Davis Group through Traffic and Blind Faith and into his work during his solo career.
Eric Clapton and the Powerhouse was a British blues rock studio group formed in 1966. They recorded three songs, which were released on the Elektra Records compilation What's Shakin' in 1966. A possible fourth song remained unreleased.
"Paper Sun" is a song by British rock band Traffic, and was released as their debut single on 26 May 1967. It was a number 5 hit in the United Kingdom, number 4 in Canada.
What's Shakin' is a compilation album released by Elektra Records in May 1966. It features the earliest studio recordings by the Lovin' Spoonful and the Paul Butterfield Blues Band, as well as the only released recordings by the ad hoc studio group Eric Clapton and the Powerhouse, until they were reissued years later.
The Live Adventures of Mike Bloomfield and Al Kooper is a double album recorded at the Fillmore West venue; the album is a successor to the studio album Super Session, which included Stephen Stills in addition to Bloomfield and Kooper, and had achieved commercial and critical success earlier in 1968.
Richard Roman Grechko, better known as Ric Grech, was a British rock musician. He is best known for playing bass guitar and violin with the rock band Family as well as in the supergroups Blind Faith and Traffic. He also played with ex-Cream drummer Ginger Baker.
Live from Madison Square Garden is a double CD and DVD live album by Eric Clapton and Steve Winwood, which was released on 19 May 2009 by Duck / Reprise Records. The album is made up of recordings from Clapton and Winwood's performances at Madison Square Garden in February 2008. It is Clapton's ninth live album and Winwood's first live album as a solo artist.
"Roamin' Thru' the Gloamin' with 40,000 Headmen", written by Steve Winwood and Jim Capaldi, was first recorded by Traffic in 1967 or 1968. It was initially released as B-side to the "No Face, No Name and No Number" single in 1968 and also appears on their second album Traffic. Blood, Sweat & Tears also recorded it on their 1970 album, Blood, Sweat & Tears 3.
Revolutions – The Very Best of Steve Winwood is the sixth compilation album by Steve Winwood. The album includes music from Winwood's solo career, as well as groups with which he has performed, including the Spencer Davis Group, Traffic, and Blind Faith. The CD was released as a box set and a single disc. As of October 2014, the box set is out of print, while the single disc is still available. The songs "The Finer Things" and "Roll With It" are exclusive to the single disc version and cannot be found on the box set.