Winwood was 18 when he formed Traffic in 1967. His plaintive, high tenor voice attracted immediate attention. It was a trademark sound that took only a few measures to identify and once heard was hard to forget. Such songs as "Low Spark of High Heeled Boys," "Colored Rain," "40,000 Headmen" and "(That Good Old Fashioned) Medicated Goo" ("a song about the '60s"), most of them written in collaboration with the drummer Jim Capaldi, were smart and wear well.
Washington Times --“Mr. Winwood kept the rug firmly planted beneath his feet while demonstrating why he remains one of rock's bona fide legends.”
Philadelphia Inquirer --“…after several tunes, the worshipful, near-capacity crowd rewarded Winwood and his crew with standing ovations…”
Washington Post --“[Winwood] was bent over the neck of his guitar and wailing with the abandon of a kid in a music store, a performance that had grown men stomping their feet and screaming as if their team had just scored a touchdown.”
NY Times --“For a couple of hours on Thursday night at the Beacon Theater, Steve Winwood allowed his fans to imagine they lived in a gentler, more joyful world.”
"I wanted to go as far as possible back to traditional recording techniques. You know, no loops or overdubs. And when I started to do it, you know, of course, I realized it gave the music a life and vibrancy; also, I was keen to combine different ethnic styles. Well, I've always been interested in combining different ethnic styles, but perhaps with this record I took it a step further by adding Brazilian elements and Afro-Cuban elements, all of which are rooted in African rhythms, but also contain a lot of European harmonic elements. And in addition to that, I tried to maintain a rock basis for the album, combined with the usual folk and jazz flavors."