Featured Album | Alternative Liner Notes

361 | Jim Capaldi | Oh How We Danced | Island ILPS 9187 | 1972

Jim Capaldi had already released five albums with his band Traffic by the time he released this, his debut solo album for Island Records in 1972.  The sessions took him to Muscle Shoals in Alabama for much of the album, working with an array of studio musicians as well as Traffic buddies Steve Winwood, Chris Wood and Rebop Kwaku Baah, together with former band mate Dave Mason and other such notables as Paul Kossoff and Ric Gretch.  Steve Winwood was dealing with his peritonitis problems at the time and was forced into a break from the band, giving the opportunity for the rest of the band to branch out and make some noises on their own.  It was the beginning of a semi-successful solo career for the drummer, who had the ability to serve as front man, eventually releasing no fewer than thirteen solo albums over a thirty-year career, his biggest achievement being a UK top ten hit with a cover of Boudleaux Bryant’s “Love Hurts”, which had already achieved success for the Every Brothers and Gram Parsons and a the Scots band Nazareth a year earlier.  If there should’ve been earlier success for Capaldi, then it might’ve been for this album’s opener “Eve”, a mid-tempo ballad featuring a lead guitar solo by the Free guitarist Paul Kossoff, which was released as a single with little success.  There’s some fine soulful performances here, which is only to be expected from an album recorded in Muscle Shoals, such as “Big Thirst”, “Don’t Be a Hero” and the title song, all featuring the Muscle Shoals Rhythm Section.          

Playlist:

Walkin’ Blues – Paul Butterfield Blues Band (East-West)

Alabama 69 – Humble Pie (As Safe as Yesterday is)

Big Thirst – Jim Capaldi (Oh How We Danced)

Warm Love – Van Morrison (Hard Nose the Highway)

August – Love (Four Sail)

I Woke Up This Morning – Ten Years After (Ssssh)

Pow R, Toc H – Pink Floyd (The Piper at the Gates of Dawn)

Percy the Penguin – Stackridge (Stackridge)

Don’t Be a Hero – Jim Capaldi (Oh How We Danced)

Won’t Get Fooled Again – The Who (Who’s Next)