Feelin' Alright: The Very Best of Traffic

1	Paper Sun 4:12
2	Hole in My Shoe 3:00
3	Heaven Is in Your Mind 4:13
4	Dear Mr. Fantasy 5:35
5	You Can All Join In 3:35
6	Feelin' Alright 4:16
7	Pearly Queen 4:18
8	Forty Thousand Headmen 3:14
9	Shanghai Noodle Factory 5:03
10	Glad 6:57
11	Freedom Rider 5:29
12	Empty Pages 4:33
13	John Barleycorn 6:20
14	Rock and Roll Stew 4:24
15	The Low Spark of High Heeled Boys 11:42

Barnes & Noble

A perfect addition to the collection of the Traffic fan who has everything (or the novice who has none), this remastered anthology brings new sonic clarity to a set of tunes undoubtedly ingrained in the gray matter of devotees. While it's certainly possible to quibble with the song selection on this 11-track CD -- "Dear Mr. Fantasy," "Feelin' Alright," and "The Low Spark of High Heeled Boys" are slam-dunks, but "Shanghai Noodle Factory" is among those that clang off the rim -- there's no denying the profound improvement brought on by the chopping and channeling that goes on in the new mix. The enhancement of the far ends of the spectrum -- the flute fillips on "40,000 Headmen," for instance -- are subtle but palpable, as is the overall clarity of sound sometimes absent in the original late-'60s haziness of the original performances. As they say, God is in the details. David Sprague

All Music Guide

Though the two-CD set Smiling Phases finally put a comprehensive Traffic compilation on the market in 1991, the only readily available single-disc collection had long been Best of Traffic, originally issued halfway through the band's career. Thus, Feelin' Alright: The Very Best of Traffic, a 77-minute sampler for the CD era, was long overdue. It combines the group's early singles hits like "Paper Sun" and "Hole in My Shoe" with lengthier album tracks like "Dear Mr. Fantasy" and "The Low Spark of High-Heeled Boys." Looking over the song list, any Traffic fan will be able to reel off omissions. But easy as it is to note what's missing, it's not so easy to figure out how such songs could be shoehorned into a single-disc set that is already packed with great material. Except in its first year in England, Traffic was not a band that made hit singles, but it did make a plethora of strong recordings, many of which were lengthy by the standards of the time. Several of the absolute necessities on a collection of their best work run longer than five minutes each; "The Low Spark of High-Heeled Boys" runs close to 12 minutes. Beyond those absolute musts are a bunch of other good songs, many more than could fit on one CD. Compilation producer Bill Levenson has made a reasonable choice among them to construct a well-balanced disc that shows off the band's many talents. Neophytes with a few extra dollars to spend are strongly urged to take the plunge and buy Smiling Phases, but as a one-CD collection of some of the highlights of Traffic's career, this album lives up to its title. William Ruhlmann