On the turntable this Sunday..Shoot Out at the Fantasy Factory

Shoot Out at the Fantasy Factory, released in 1973, was the seventh album and sixth studio album by English rock band Traffic. It followed their 1971 album The Low Spark of High Heeled Boys and contained five songs. Shoot Out, while achieving poorer reviews than its predecessor, did reach number six on the Billboard Pop Albums chart, one space higher than Low Spark had peaked in 1972. Like its predecessor, the original jacket for the Shoot Out LP had its top right and bottom left corners clipped. The album was remastered for CD in 2003. 

Retrospective reviews were less forgiving, with Allmusic stating that both the compositions and the performances are uniformly weak, adding up to "a competent, if perfunctory effort in the band's familiar style", while Robert Christgau's review consisted of a single sentence followed by the note 'Giveaway: "(Sometimes I Feel So) Uninspired."' Rolling Stone had a subdued reaction, saying that most of the songs are too even-tempered and uniform in structure and tone, but that "Evening Blue" and "(Sometimes I Feel So) Uninspired" are high points. They summarized that the album "embodies the inconsistencies that beset the band as well as the high points that have kept Traffic moving."

Track listing:

All songs written by Steve Winwood and Jim Capaldi unless otherwise indicated.

1. "Shoot Out at the Fantasy Factory" – 6:05
2. "Roll Right Stones" – 13:40
3. "Evening Blue" – 5:19
4. "Tragic Magic" (Chris Wood) – 6:43
5. "(Sometimes I Feel So) Uninspired" – 7:31

Versions of the album

The original, full-length master of Shoot Out at the Fantasy Factory was originally only heard on the original U.S. vinyl version. This was at a time when Island Records was an independent label and the album was manufactured and distributed by Capitol Records.
When Island's distribution deal with Capitol ended, Traffic submitted a revised master in which "Roll Right Stones" and "Uninspired" were remixed and faded out early.  "Uninspired" was shortened by about 15 seconds and "Roll Right Stones" by a full two minutes. This shortened master was used for all subsequent copies of the album until May 2003. With Island's 2003 remaster of the album, the original full-length versions of these songs finally became available on CD. LPs and CDs with the shortened versions of these songs falsely list the longer times for them.

Personnel:

• Steve Winwood – vocals, guitar, piano, organ
• Chris Wood – saxophone, flute
• Jim Capaldi – percussion, backing vocal on "Roll Right Stones"
• David Hood – bass Of The Muscle Shoals Sound Rhythm Section
• Roger Hawkins – drums Of The Muscle Shoals Sound Rhythm Section
• Rebop – percussion

Additional personnel:

• Barry Beckett – keyboards on "Tragic Magic" Of The Muscle Shoals Sound Rhythm Section
• Jimmy Johnson – clarinet on "Tragic Magic" Of The Muscle Shoals Sound Rhythm Section

• Tony Wright – cover art

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia