Tag: Paper Sun

Lets go back to the psychedelic sixties with this song that was released in the Summer of Love. The song fit perfectly with the times even featuring an Indian sitar played by Dave Mason. That year had singles such as  “Strawberry Fields Forever”, “Ruby Tuesday”, “Sunshine Of Your Love”, “Nights In White Satin”, “Whiter Shade of Pale”, “See Emily Play”…the list goes on and on. This is a great example of British psychedelia.

Steve Winwood and Jim Capaldi wrote this song in  1967 when Winwood and Capaldi were members of two different bands.  They were on tour together, and after a show put the song together in a hotel room.

When Winwood and Capaldi formed Traffic a short time later with Dave Mason and Chris Wood, they recorded Paper Sun and released it as their first single.

The song peaked at #5 in the UK, #4 in Canada, and #94 in the Billboard 100 in 1967.

Jim Capaldi: “I got the title from a newspaper in a boarding house in Newcastle,”  “I was half-asleep, lying there writing this lyric in my head at about 3:30 in the morning. I woke up Steve with this idea and then we went into the living room where there was a little upright piano and finished the song.”

Paper Sun

So you think you’re having good times
With the boy that you just met
Kicking sand from beach to beach
Your clothes are soaking wet
But if you look around and see
A shadow on the run (on the run)
Don’t be too upset because it’s just a paper sun

Ah paper sun, ah paper sun

In the room where you’ve been sleeping
All our clothes are thrown about
Cigarettes burn window sills
Your meter’s all run out
But there again it’s nothing
You just split when day is done (day is gone)
Hitching lifts to nowhere, hung up on the paper sun

Ah paper sun, ah paper sun

Standing in the cool of my room
Fresh cut flowers give me sweet perfume (too much sun will burn)
Too much sun will burn (too much sun will burn)
Too much sun will burn

When you’re feeling tired and lonely
You see people going home
You can’t make the train fare
Or the sixpence for the phone
And icicles you’re crying
Down your cheek have just begun
Don’t be sad, good times are had
Beneath the paper sun

Ah paper sun, ah paper sun

Daylight breaks while you sleep on the sand
A seagull is stealing the ring from your hand
The boy who had given you so much fun
Has left you so cold in the paper sun
In the paper sun, in the paper sun, in the paper sun, in the paper sun