Harman Patil (Editor)

Traffic and Weather

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Released
  
April 3, 2007

Artist
  
Fountains of Wayne

Producer
  
Adam Schlesinger

Genres
  
Rock music, Power pop

Length
  
47:27

Release date
  
3 April 2007

Label
  
Virgin Records

Traffic and Weather httpsuploadwikimediaorgwikipediaenthumb5

Traffic and Weather (2007)
  
Sky Full of Holes (2011)

Similar
  
Utopia Parkway, Sky Full of Holes, Out‑of‑State Plates, Welcome Interstate Managers, Look to the Sky

Traffic and Weather is the fourth studio album by the American rock band Fountains of Wayne. It was released on Virgin Records in April 2007.

Contents

Fountains of wayne fire in the canyon


Release

The album was met with moderate commercial success and favorable reviews. It reached #97 on the Billboard 200 albums chart, and the song "I-95" was named #54 in Rolling Stone's's list of the 100 Best Songs of 2007. Blender described the album as having "more witty tales of confused young people caught between destinations".

Details

According to an interview on New York's WCBS-AM, the band claimed the title of the album, which was mixed by Michael Brauer and John Holbrook, was inspired by the news station's "traffic and weather together on the eights".

The song "Someone to Love" includes backing vocals from former Smashing Pumpkins and Hole bassist Melissa Auf der Maur, "Fire in the Canyon" contains backing vocals from the Candy Butchers' Mike Viola, "Seatbacks and Traytables" features former Smashing Pumpkins guitarist James Iha, and "Strapped for Cash" features trumpeters Ronnie Buttacavoli and Scott Wendholt; the former trumpeter also plays on "Yolanda Hayes".

The song "Traffic & Weather" is featured on KYW-TV/WPSG in Philadelphia during its morning traffic and weather segments.

Track listing

All tracks written by Chris Collingwood and Adam Schlesinger.

Personnel

  • Chris Collingwood – lead vocals, rhythm guitar
  • Adam Schlesinger – bass, keyboards, backing vocals
  • Jody Porter – lead guitar, backing vocals
  • Brian Young – drums

    • Quotes about the album

    All quotes from Adam Schlesinger.

    General

  • "I don't think anybody is counting on us for another one [Stacy's Mom Standard Hit] of those. I hope not."
  • "As usual, there are a lot of songs about transportation and travel."
  • "Our goal is 12 units, then if we hit 13, it looks like a runaway success."
  • "(Billy Corgan) was busy putting that other Smashing Pumpkins reunion together while we were working on this Smashing Pumpkins reunion on our record."

    • Songs

  • "Someone to Love": "a little bit 'Eleanor Rigby'-esque, in that it's about these two lonely people living in New York. It has a disco-y beat, which is something we don't do a lot of. Melissa Auf der Maur sings backing vocals, and that's the first female vocal we've had since Dominique Durand from Ivy on the first album."
  • "'92 Subaru": "It kind of sounds like The Doobie Brothers or Little Feat or something."
  • "Yolanda Hayes": "About a woman who works at the DMV"

    • Recording

  • "We had these grand ambitions to change our process, we went up to Woodstock and jammed, but in the end, only one thing from that session, 'Strapped for Cash,' turned into an actual song. For the rest of it, we went back to our usual method of writing on our own and bringing in a song to be arranged by everyone. Woodstock was good to get back together and loosen up, but I guess we're pretty set in our ways."

    • Songs

    1Someone to Love3:53
    2'92 Subaru3:13
    3Yolanda Hayes4:01

    References

    Traffic and Weather Wikipedia
    (Text) CC BY-SA