Traffic — Paper Sun
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Length: 3:21
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So you think you're having good times
With the boy that you just met
Kicking sand from beach to beach
Your clothes all soaking wet
But if you look around and see
A shadow on the run
Don't be too upset because it's just a paper sun
Ahh Paper Sun
Ahh Paper Sun
In the room where you've been sleeping
All your clothes all thrown about
Cigarettes burn window sills
Your meter's all run out
But then again it's nothing
You just split when day is done
Pitching lips to nowhere, hung up on the paper sun
Standing in the cool of my room
Fresh cut flowers give me sweet perfume
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 six pence for the phone
And icicles your crying
From your cheek have just begun
Don't be sad, good times are had
Beneath the 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
With the boy that you just met
Kicking sand from beach to beach
Your clothes all soaking wet
But if you look around and see
A shadow on the run
Don't be too upset because it's just a paper sun
Ahh Paper Sun
Ahh Paper Sun
In the room where you've been sleeping
All your clothes all thrown about
Cigarettes burn window sills
Your meter's all run out
But then again it's nothing
You just split when day is done
Pitching lips to nowhere, hung up on the paper sun
Standing in the cool of my room
Fresh cut flowers give me sweet perfume
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 six pence for the phone
And icicles your crying
From your cheek have just begun
Don't be sad, good times are had
Beneath the 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
Comments (51)add comment
One of the first albums I bought (w/ Disraeli Gears). Great album and this is not even the best tune on it.
Ah traffic - good old traffic. Stevie plays a mean guitar as well as keys
Always think how much Winwood sounds like Gabriel here.
GREAT!! ICONIC!! It is the first Traffic tune that I ever heard! They actually played it on AM radio when it first came out! Low power(5Kwatt) WMCA (Good Guys) 570AM NYC! High power(50Kwatt), WABC 770AM NYC, never played good stuff like this!
RParadise wrote: This really takes me back. Remember the days when a sitar in a rock song was "world music"?
George Harrison single-handedly did that!
George Harrison single-handedly did that!
always thought Traffic was amazing...Stevie Winwood still is!
rulebritannia wrote:
i like your generation a lot.
RParadise wrote:
This really takes me back. Remember the days when a sitar in a rock song was "world music"?
I was standing in a Greenwich Village instrument shop in 1968 trying to decide whether I should buy that mother-of-pearl inlaid sitar when this song came over the stereo. I played that sitar for years - until it was crushed by the crowd at an anti-war rally where I was setting the musical scene on stage. A classic '60s story.
i like your generation a lot.
LSD was a thing back then. This track like others is good when using hallucinogenics THC or LSD etc.
Its not a beer bar pool table ship kinking thing
Its not a beer bar pool table ship kinking thing
Oh Yeah!
pbflyingdutchman wrote:
That may be because we were fifty years younger then.
From the era where things seem simple and life was a joy!
That may be because we were fifty years younger then.
From the era where things seem simple and life was a joy!
Nice to hear this one again 
Excuse me while I crank up my way-back machine ... a true gem from those early days!
sounds like Stonehenge song from Spinal Tap
Massively impressive debut album, which one thought couldn't be topped. Then they came out with Traffic.
At first I thought it was an old Genesis tune but with Peter Gabriel not sounding quite right.
Then I looked at the cover art and saw it's Traffic with ol' Stevie Winwood.
Fun tune.
Then I looked at the cover art and saw it's Traffic with ol' Stevie Winwood.
Fun tune.
Wow, never heard this before. For a moment it sounded like Gabriel, and I thought this might be a lost Genesis track or something.
Reminds me of Spinal Tap in their psychedelic phase...
They were definitely on something wacky when they wrote this!
Quite like it, actually :-)
Great to hear this classic again!
What a great and unique song.
6:43 am - Traffic - Paper Sun
6:41 am - They Might Be Giants - Why Does The Sun Shine? (The Sun Is A Mass Of Incandesc...
6:37 am - Richie Havens - Here Comes The Sun
6:35 am - Pogues - The Sunny Side Of the Street
Bill is in a SUNNY mood (again, apparently!)....
Much better.
hippiechick wrote:
Thanks for the sunny set, Bill!
But playing it when it's snowing in April on the east coast is just cruel.
Looks as though Bill's on a Solar binge:
Traffic - Paper Sun
They Might Be Giants - Why Does The Sun Shine? ...
Richie Havens - Here Comes The Sun
Pogues - The Sunny Side Of the Street
Wonder what's next?
Only a Paper Moon?
Bring on the Night?
Nights in White Satin?
laramieu wrote:
This represents an important step in the evolution of modern rock and roll
Does it? Winwood and Traffic, yes. But this song?
hippiechick wrote:
Pogues - The Sunny Side of the Street
Richie Havens - Here Comes the Sun
TMBG - Why Does the Sun Shine?
Traffic - Paper Sun
Thanks for the sunny set, Bill!
You must not be in the northeast USA - no sun for four days running kind of makes all these sunny songs torment.
tictocsailor wrote:
So much great music from that time.. why resurrect this?
This represents an important step in the evolution of modern rock and roll
Pogues - The Sunny Side of the Street
Richie Havens - Here Comes the Sun
TMBG - Why Does the Sun Shine?
Traffic - Paper Sun
Thanks for the sunny set, Bill!
:sunny.gif: 
yuck
So much great music from that time.. why resurrect this?
dpjag wrote:
I'm glad they got better
True, but this song is pretty great. Very timely and historic - sort of like early Grateful Dead when they were the Warlocks. Ya just gotta love it!
Listen to what the Flower People say.
Hannio wrote: And that would be "nattering nabobs of negativism"....
Poo! to all you nattering nabobs of negativity! This song is the grooviest!
Yeah baby!
I'm glad they got better
one of the first albums that i listened to under the influence
ah sweet youth!
Poo! to all you nattering nabobs of negativity! This song is the grooviest!
Grooovy, baby. 
RParadise wrote:
This really takes me back. Remember the days when a sitar in a rock song was "world music"?
I was standing in a Greenwich Village instrument shop in 1968 trying to decide whether I should buy that mother-of-pearl inlaid sitar when this song came over the stereo. I played that sitar for years - until it was crushed by the crowd at an anti-war rally where I was setting the musical scene on stage. A classic '60s story.
Wow! Is this the first song Traffic ever did? Still sounds like Steve Winwood though. Pretty cool, very groovy!
This was my introduction to Traffic. Not their best tune, but it still makes me smile. 
This really takes me back. Remember the days when a sitar in a rock song was "world music"?
Classic tripe is still tripe.
Never again, please never again... <-o<
ewwww, not one of traffic's better tunes 
...the horror....the horror.... 
Make it stop..... 
Oh yeah !! That makes us feel real young !! Still a great tune
From the era where things seem simple and life was a joy!
Maybe for you but I lived in DC. The rift between the generations was huge. We also had race riots. This was not a simple time. I have heard that older people speak wistfully of life in East Germany.