Album : Traffic – John Barleycorn Must Die

CB was a fan of Traffic having been introduced through ‘The Best Of’.  This was his first step into their world after that.  Pretty much hoping for the same sound and style.

Right off the top with ‘Glad’ he gets a real cool piano riff with the drums laying the beat, organ filling in and then the sax coming in.  What a cool sound.  Jazzy feel.  The piano is really catchy with the sax trading licks and solos.  An instrumental for an opening and CB was loving it.  ‘Freedom Rider’ opens with piano and sax again.  Then there’s that familiar voice of Steve Winwood.  Some flute thrown in and yeah there was that Traffic sound.  CB was digging this.  More extended jams but it was sounding good.  Chris Wood works out on the flute.  Great Traffic tune.  ‘Empty Pages’ ends side one.  Another real good tune.  Winwood’s vocals don’t hurt.  He also plays some real good keyboard.  Traffic was feeling a little funky and jazzy on this one.  These guys were turning CB onto some real good music.  Side one didn’t disappoint.

Side two opens up with ‘Stranger to Himself’.  Winwood busts out a guitar and has his own sound.  Hard song to pin down, more of a hard edge, more into the rock sound.  Again they turn into a jam band on this one.  It works.  CB liked bands that kept thing interesting as long as it sounded good and this does.  ‘John Barleycorn’ is a traditional folk song.  CB is a sucker for a story song and JB satisfies that.  Wood’s flute enhances the feel.  Traffic kills this tune.  They could play so many different styles, mixed bag.  CB was pulling for JB in the song.  He didn’t know anything about John Barleycorn  (went on to do years of research on the subject).  He was getting an education and hearing some great music at the same time.   Great take by the boys.  ‘Every Mothers Son’ is a little workout for Winwood and ends the record.  It’s a good one.

‘John Barleycorn Must Die’ just solidified CB’s like for this band and when CB likes something he goes whole hog and that’s what he did with Traffic.  There was more Steve Winwood,  Jim Capaldi and Chris Wood to listen to and discover.  It started with ‘The Best of Traffic’ which led to this album and to more.  Traffic was becoming a favorite band.

“And little Sir John with his nut brown bowl, proved the strongest at last…”