Traffic – The Low Spark Of High Heeled Boys

I first learned of Traffic with one of my favorite songs of all time, Dear Mr Fantasy. I remember this one on our rock station in Nashville, WKDF. They would play new rock songs and mix classic ones in as well. I kept up with the newer releases because of that, and heard classic songs I hadn’t heard before. Seems like a winning combination, but that is rare, if not impossible, to find now. 

This song is one of those songs you just let play and enjoy every single second of it. It was released in 1971 but was not released as a single…It clocked in at 12 minutes long. Jim Capaldi started writing this in Morocco, where he was getting ready to make a movie called Nevertheless with actor Michael J. Pollard. The film project fell through, but it did lead to one of Traffic’s best-known songs.

Jim Capaldi and Steve Winwood wrote this song. Dave Mason had left the band by this time, but Traffic added some new members for the Low Spark Of High Heeled Boys album, including drummer Jim Gordon from Derek and the Dominos, which allowed Capaldi to focus more on vocals. Original member Chris Wood played the saxophone on this track. The album did much better in the US than in the UK at the time. 

The percussionist was Rebop Kwaku Baah, who played on the album and live as well. Later on, Rebop was dismissed from Traffic during the recording sessions for their 1974 album When the Eagle Flies… One problem they had with him was live concerts, according to Steve Winwood: “He insisted on going onstage and singing – and he can’t sing!” He would later be on Winwood’s first solo album in 1977, so he must have given up singing.

Jim Capaldi: “Pollard and I would sit around writing lyrics all day, talking about Bob Dylan and the Band, thinking up ridiculous plots for the movie. Before I left Morocco, Pollard wrote in my book ‘The Low Spark of High Heeled Boys.’ For me, it summed him up. He had this tremendous rebel attitude. He walked around in his cowboy boots, his leather jacket. At the time he was a heavy little dude. It seemed to sum up all the people of that generation who were just rebels. The ‘Low Spark,’ for me, was the spirit, high-spirited. You know, standing on a street corner. The low rider. The ‘Low Spark’ meaning that strong undercurrent at the street level.” 

The Low Spark of High Heeled Boys

If you see something that looks like a star
And it’s shooting up out of the ground
And your head is spinning from a loud guitar
And you just can’t escape from the sound
Don’t worry too much, it’ll happen to you
We were children once, playing with toys
And the thing that you’re hearing is only the sound of
The low spark of high-heeled boys
The percentage you’re paying is too high a price
While you’re living beyond all your means
And the man in the suit has just bought a new car 
From the profit he’s made on your dreams
But today you just read that the man was shot dead 
By a gun that didn’t make any noise
But it wasn’t the bullet that laid him to rest was 
The low spark of high-heeled boys
If you had just a minute to breathe and they granted you one final wish
Would you ask for something like another chance?
Or something similar as this? Don’t worry too much
It’ll happen to you as sure as your sorrows are joys
And the thing that disturbs you is only the sound of 
The low spark of high-heeled boys
If I gave you everything that I owned and asked for nothing in return
Would you do the same for me as I would for you?
Or take me for a ride, and strip me of everything including my pride
But spirit is something that no one destroys
And the sound that I’m hearing is only the sound
The low spark of high-heeled boys

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Author: Badfinger (Max)

Power Pop fan, Baseball, Beatles, Alternative music, old movies, and tv show fan. Also anything to do with pop culture in the 60s and 70s... I'm also a songwriter, bass and guitar player. Not the slightest bit interested in politics at all.

50 thoughts on “Traffic – The Low Spark Of High Heeled Boys”

    1. Oh that is Jim Capaldi the regular drummer but on this tour he concentrated on vocals more…the bongo guy was Rebop Kwaku Baah…I love that live version of the song

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  4. As soon as I saw the title of your post in my email I got out the headphones. This was a new direction for Traffic at the time. The intro to this song hints that it’s not going to be a three minute single. Nor does it have anything to do with traditional English folk ballads. I went right out and bought this album in 1971. I was hooked by “And the man in the suit has just bought a new car/From the profit he’s made on your dreams.”

    I had to look up what that long solo was. I thought it was a synthesizer but there is no mention of synthesizer in the credits I could find. Hammond organ with fuzz.

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    1. I was telling someone else that I’m happy that FM Radio picked this up along with other songs back then that wasn’t made for AM.
      That is a great line…
      Anything Winwood has had an association with I usually like. I never thought about the solo…it is odd. In some spots it sounds like a sax. Ok I found i as well. : Chris Wood on tenor saxophone and by Winwood both on piano and on a Hammond organ distorted through a fuzzbox. THAT is a cool concept with the fuzz box

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  6. Nobody knows what this song was written about, and nobody will ever figure it out. Some people think it was a response to the Glam bands that were starting to appear in music, others say it is about the music industry, some say it is about drugs, whatever it is a great song to listen to.

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    1. It reminds me of a feel (doesn’t sound like them) of an Allman Brothers or Grateful Dead song…you just turn it up and listen and its great.

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  9. This is the Traffic song I think of if I do think of them and it’s a good one. The classic rock station in Toronto would sometimes play it, don’t hear it much elsewhere probably due to its length. Never had a clue what it was about though

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    1. Like I told someone…it’s like an Allman Brothers song…not sounding like that but one of those FM hits you just turn up and listen to.

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  11. Pingback: Traffic – The Low Spark Of High Heeled Boys – MobsterTiger

  14. I knew Traffic when I was younger, but didn’t really listen until later in life, I think after hearing Ric Grech at some point…not that long ago found a live version of Mr Fantasy with Winwood and Clapton..I always like seeing all the connections, Derek and the Dominos is typical, and then later on you see Dave Mason hooking up with Fleedwood Mac during one of Buckingham’s breaks from that band…..who was it that used to make up those huge flowcharts of various band histories, it’s like everyone during a certain era played with everyone else at some point….

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    1. You know Warren…I’ve been looking for some solo stuff by Ric Grech after listening to Blind Faith ….I want to find something by him to post.
      You are right…they all connected together during this time. Jim Gordon ended up on a lot of recordings by everyone. He had a sad story of course.

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      1. I’m digging through the streaming services to see if i can find that doc on the sessio folks like Gordon and Waddy Wachtel….like the wrecking crew and walking through the shadows of motown, it’s got to be worth a watch

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    1. I do as well! When I was a teen in the 80s I only knew their hits…but yea I’ve branched out since then. Thanks for reading…I appreciate it.

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      2. I don’t think he was in a TZ episode but he was in a Hitchcock episode…that may be where you are thinking. I’m not sure about the Peppard movie. He was also in a Tales From the Crypt episode as well.

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  20. This and Rainmaker are my favourite songs from the album, absolutely love them. And I put the album on every few weeks – it lifts my mood. Takes me back.

    I’ve been trying to put my finger on the ‘exact’ (as if that were possible!) feeling I get when listening to favourite music from particular periods of my life. It’s difficult, isn’t it? It’s kind of like time travel but without all the accompanying stuff that went on then. I sometimes get a brief glimpse of part of a room, or a coloured light (room light or gig venue lighting), or some sort of warmth. How about you?

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    1. Somebody else I think mentioned that one. I’ll have to listen to that one.
      Music does work as a time table and I can remember what I was out and what I was doing when I listen to certain songs.
      It Won’t Be Long by the Beatles…I was in an old shed when I was 8 in 1975 with friends that we made into a club. To answer your question yes…I can feel the same feeling of whatever it was…good or bad.

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      1. Hope you enjoy it!

        The intro to Magical Mystery Tour somehow takes me back to sunny days in central London, wandering around handing joss sticks to strangers (including workmen in holes in the road!). I was a hippy, in case you hadn’t guessed!

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  21. This was always such an odd song to hear on the radio but one of the classic rock stations would play it now and again, and it’s one of my favorites.

    EMF (yes, the ‘Unbelievable’ band) did a great cover of it as a b-side to one of their later singles!

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