Author: Peter Podbrežnik
Artist: Traffic
Label: Island Records
Release: 1967
Running time: 33:54
Rating: 4.5/5
The legendary British forefathers of progressive rock, Traffic, recorded a ton of fascinating material during a relatively short career, one in which they broke up not once but twice, and it earned them a permanent place among the most respected rock bands of all time. With a lineup this stacked with talent, led by the superb singer, keyboardist and occasional guitarist Steve Winwood, who founded the band after leaving the Spencer Davis Group, and including drummer Jim Capaldi, sadly no longer with us, you wouldn’t expect anything less.
Between Winwood and Dave Mason, a guitarist, bassist and sitar player who was just as versatile and distinctive a musician, a rivalry over songwriting and over which tracks made the album had already taken shape while the debut was being put together. They also disagreed about where the band should go next. While Winwood was leaning more and more toward blues rock, Mason was getting excited about folk and psychedelia and wanted to keep pushing the band’s original art rock direction. That rivalry led Mason to quit the band even before the debut came out, but he later changed his mind, came back for a short spell in 1968 and made two more albums with them.
Traffic’s debut “Mr. Fantasy” was a wildly interesting and witty product of experimenting with psychedelic rock. With flute and saxophone, under the direction of reed player and organist Chris Wood, they worked in elements of folk too, and in doing so created one of the most important albums in the birth of progressive rock. On a few tracks you can hear Mason’s sitar, which The Beatles had successfully popularized within rock, and Western music in general, the year before. Winwood’s charismatic vocals give some of the compositions a whiff of blues and soul, while his and Mason’s guitar vocabulary offers surprisingly little of the blues rock tendencies that were so hugely popular at the time.
The album is steeped in a typically British atmosphere from start to finish, since the lyrics are full of that classic Anglo-Saxon black humor, which smells strongly of the English countryside, or rather the county of Berkshire, where the band had their base in 1967. It’s also worth saying that, unlike most psychedelic rock bands of the era, with Pink Floyd at the head of the pack, Traffic showed no trace whatsoever of the influence of all manner of mind-altering substances.
“Mr. Fantasy” is packed with compositions that soon became known as Traffic classics, even though their hugely popular first three singles, “Paper Sun”, “Hole in My Shoe” and “Here We Go Round the Mulberry Bush”, aren’t on the original British release. One such classic is the opener “Heaven Is in Your Mind”, which was also the title of the American version of the album, and which wins you over with an effective mix of simplicity, wit and maximum commitment from every musician. An elegant piano motif is built up with a witty guitar melody and tasty vocal harmonies, while Mason shines right away with a first-rate guitar solo. That Traffic were incorrigible jokers is shown plain as day by the next two creations, “Berkshire Poppies” and “House For Everyone”.
The ode to the Berkshire poppy is a biting satire on English petty-bourgeois life, evoking the scampering of the Queen’s lapdogs. The mocking vocals and a circus-like piano melody that gradually picks up speed and finally morphs into an outright burlesque, with a profusion of grotesque sounds in the background, are the key reason that anyone who often misses humor in rock will still enjoy listening to it today. “House For Everyone” is another mischievous, playful little number, one that sounds like a cross between a comedy and a horror flick, as if Monty Python had run into Count Dracula. This time the quirky saxophone melody and the flute improvisations take center stage, while Winwood once again turns into a highly convincing teller of English folk tales.
With the excellent ballad “No Face, No Name, No Number”, carried by a melancholy melody on mellotron and piano and a superb vocal performance from Winwood, the band suddenly decides to get serious. “Dear Mr. Fantasy”, led by a crafty fusion of folk and blues rock, is the best-known Traffic classic on the album, one the band members dedicated forty years later to the late Jim Capaldi. The gritty harmonica and the melancholy guitar solo make this evergreen by far the most blues-rock-sounding moment on the entire album. The folk-rock-spiced “Dealer” has a bouncy melody on acoustic guitar and flute and energetic vocal harmonies. You can pick out plenty of elements on it that helped give birth to folk prog rock.
“Utterly Simple” is by far the most psychedelic creation on the album, clearly under the influence of the “quiet Beatle” George Harrison and soaked in Mason’s ethereal sitar and serene singing. “Coloured Rain” is a typical Winwood creation, with a top-notch vocal performance and a spirited melody on Wood’s organ, plus plenty of interesting improvisations on saxophone and guitar. On the next folk rocker, “Hope I Never Find Me There”, they conjure up a playful pastoral melody and bring back their sharp sense of humor. The closing instrumental “Giving to You” is the most experimental piece on the album, with branching rhythms and witty improvisations, and for a short while they even flirt with elements of jazz, which would become a far more important part of their musical vocabulary on future Traffic albums.
“Mr. Fantasy” is one of the greatest debut albums in rock history. It was a huge part of how Steve Winwood became a household name worldwide, and it still ranks among the best things this legendary band ever did. The album has passed the test of time with flying colors and still thrills at least as much as it did on release, if not even more. On top of the incredible technical chops and unique talents of every member, you can credit their knack for writing light, instantly catchy melodies and their boyish humor, which made it easy to charm a wider audience, all while staying experimental enough to satisfy even the more demanding prog rock connoisseurs today. Unlike most of their musical peers, that is, the rest of the more or less legendary psychedelic rock and future prog rock pioneers, Traffic never wanted to burden listeners by making them strain their brain folds or hunt for a “sixth sense”, and instead preferred to serve up pure fun.
Lineup
Steve Winwood – vocals, guitar, piano, harmonica, organ, bass guitar, percussion
Dave Mason – guitar, sitar, tambura, shakkai, mellotron, bass guitar, vocals
Chris Wood – flute, saxophone, organ, vocals
Jim Capaldi – drums, percussion, vocals
Production
Jimmy Miller
Track list
1. Heaven Is in Your Mind (4:16)
2. Berkshire Poppies (2:55)
3. House for Everyone (2:05)
4. No Face, No Name, No Number (3:35)
5. Dear Mr. Fantasy (5:44)
6. Dealer (3:34)
7. Utterly Simple (3:16)
8. Coloured Rain (2:43)
9. Hope I Never Find Me There (2:12)
10. Giving to You (4:20)
