''When the Eagle Flies'' is the seventh studio album released by

English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England ** English national ide ...

rock band

Traffic Traffic comprises pedestrians, vehicles, ridden or herded animals, trains, and other conveyances that use public ways (roads) for travel and transportation. Traffic laws govern and regulate traffic, while rules of the road include traffic ...

, in 1974. The album featured

Jim Capaldi Nicola James Capaldi (2 August 1944 – 28 January 2005) was an English singer-songwriter and drummer. His musical career spanned more than four decades. He co-founded the progressive rock band Traffic in 1967 with Steve Winwood with whom he co ...

Steve Winwood Stephen Lawrence Winwood (born 12 May 1948) is an English musician, singer, and songwriter whose genres include blue-eyed soul, rhythm and blues, blues rock, and pop rock. Though primarily a keyboard player and vocalist prominent for his disti ...

and Chris Wood, with

Rosko Gee Rosko Gee is a Jamaican bassist, who has played with the English band Traffic on their albums ''When the Eagle Flies'' (1974) and ''The Last Great Traffic Jam'' (2005); with Go featuring Stomu Yamashta, Steve Winwood, Michael Shrieve, Klaus Sch ...

on bass guitar. Percussionist

Rebop Kwaku Baah Anthony "Rebop" Kwaku Baah (13 February 1944 – 12 January 1983) was a Ghanaian percussionist who worked with the 1970s rock groups Traffic and Can. Biography Baah was born on 13 February 1944, in Konongo, Gold Coast. In 1969, Baah performe ...

was fired prior to the album's completion, but two tracks feature his playing. Winwood plays a broader variety of keyboard instruments than most previous Traffic albums, adding Moog to their repertoire. This was the last Traffic album for 20 years, when Winwood and Capaldi reunited for

Far from Home Far from Home may refer to: Film and television * ''Far from Home'' (1975 film), a 1975 Iranian film * ''Far from Home'' (1989 film), a 1989 American thriller * '' Far from Home: The Adventures of Yellow Dog'', a 1994 American adventure film * ...

in 1994. ''When the Eagle Flies'' was the band's fourth consecutive studio album to reach the

American American(s) may refer to: * American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America" ** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America ** American ancestry, pe ...

Top TenTraffic in the USA Charts
Allmusic. Retrieved August 9, 2011. and have

gold album Music recording certification is a system of certifying that a music recording has shipped, sold, or streamed a certain number of units. The threshold quantity varies by type (such as album, single, music video) and by nation or territory (see ...

status. It was far less successful in the United Kingdom, where it entered the charts at number 31 only to drop off the following week.Traffic in the UK Charts
, The Official Charts. Retrieved August 9, 2011. Traffic toured to support the release, but they disbanded in the middle of the tour in 1974. The Chris Wood composition "Moonchild Vulcan" was recorded for the album, but ultimately left off in favour of "Memories of a Rock n' Rolla". The song was played on the supporting tour for the album, however, and a live recording by Traffic was later released on the posthumous Chris Wood CD ''Vulcan'', released in 2008.

Reception

Rolling Stone ''Rolling Stone'' is an American monthly magazine that focuses on music, politics, and popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco, San Francisco, California, in 1967 by Jann Wenner, and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason. It was first kno ...

'' called the album uneven, saying that its bleak tone works superbly on "Graveyard People" and "Walking in the Wind", but elsewhere it often "turns anemic as a result of either a poorly conceived arrangement or inadequate production." However, they regarded the use of tighter and more concise songs as a promising change in direction for the band, and recommended the album based on the renewed strength of Winwood/Capaldi's songwriting and Winwood's work with the keyboards.

Allmusic AllMusic (previously known as All Music Guide and AMG) is an American online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on musicians and bands. Initiated in 1991, the databas ...

's retrospective review asserted the opposite: that the album indulged in long and meandering instrumentation more than any other work by Traffic, with even the vocals doing no more than "improvising his melodies over the music, paying little heed to the meaning of the words".

Track listing

Personnel

;Traffic *

– vocals, acoustic piano,

organ Organ may refer to: Biology * Organ (biology), a part of an organism Musical instruments * Organ (music), a family of keyboard musical instruments characterized by sustained tone ** Electronic organ, an electronic keyboard instrument ** Hammond ...

Mellotron The Mellotron is an electro-mechanical musical instrument developed in Birmingham, England, in 1963. It is played by pressing its keys, each of which pushes a length of magnetic tape against a capstan, which pulls it across a playback head. A ...

Moog synthesizer The Moog synthesizer is a modular synthesizer developed by the American engineer Robert Moog. Moog debuted it in 1964, and Moog's company R. A. Moog Co. (later known as Moog Music) produced numerous models from 1965 to 1981, and again from 20 ...

, guitars * Chris Wood –

flute The flute is a family of classical music instrument in the woodwind group. Like all woodwinds, flutes are aerophones, meaning they make sound by vibrating a column of air. However, unlike woodwind instruments with reeds, a flute is a reedless ...

, saxophones *

– bass *

– drums, percussion, backing vocals (5), keyboards *

(uncredited) – congas and percussion (3, 7)

Production

Chris Blackwell Christopher Percy Gordon Blackwell (born 22 June 1937) is an English businessman and former record producer, and the founder of Island Records, which has been called "one of Britain's great independent labels". According to the Rock and Roll ...

– producer * Nobby Clark – engineer * Brian Humphries – engineer * Jeff Willens – mastering * Bill DeYoung – liner notes * Martin Hughes – cover design * Bill Levenson – reissue supervisor * Monique McGuffin – reissue production coordination * Vartan – reissue art director

Charts

Notes

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:When The Eagle Flies Traffic (band) albums 1974 albums Albums produced by Chris Blackwell Island Records albums