10/13/2023 0 Comments Traffic glad/ freedom rider![]() Winwood’s decision to re-form Traffic paid off. “Stranger to Himself” and “Every Mother’s Son” give him a chance to shine on electric guitar, which had been neglected on the rest of the record. Its main character was “cut off at the knee” with scythes, pricked in the heart with pitchforks and “ground between two stones.” But before anybody thinks this is an act of brutal murder, “John Barleycorn” is an anthropomorphized version of barley, and therefore he was being “killed” to make whiskey and beer.īookending “John Barleycorn (Must Die)” on the second side are the two songs Steve Winwood intended for the solo album, which had the tentative title Mad Shadows. “That particular song” was the title track, a British folk tune whose origins can be traced back to 16th century Scotland. It gave it something that only a soulful singer and a group of musicians with experience of jazz and blues and rock music could have done.” Ian Anderson of Jethro Tull later named John Barleycorn Must Die as one of his 10 essential folk-rock albums: “While you couldn’t call it a folk album, it did feature that particular song, which was done in a really hybrid way. ![]() While the former is John Barleycorn's best-known song, the latter’s poppy melody, soaring chorus and R&B groove feel like the template for Winwood’s solo hits that would arrive a decade later. Wood alternates between flute and sax over Winwood’s soulful vocals, and there’s plenty of room for both of them to stretch out in their solos without going too long. The next two songs, “Freedom Rider” and “Empty Pages” are probably the ones that most accurately define the album’s sound.
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