What Was Steve Winwood’s Last US Top 40 Hit?

Steve Winwood’s career stands as one of the most decorated in the entirety of pop/rock music history. The man has been a part of no less than three hugely influential bands. And he emerged from all that with a massively successful solo career as well.

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Speaking of that solo career, Winwood managed to extend his chart-winning streak into the 90s with one more US Top 40 single in that decade. That song actually catapulted him back into one of his legendary bands, too.

How Stevie Went Solo

Winwood put off being a solo artist for as long as he could. He liked being able to bounce ideas off collaborators in a band setting. And he wasn’t necessarily the type who needed or particularly enjoyed all the attention that came with his name being on the marquee.

Interestingly, Winwood almost went solo right at the beginning of the 70s. His band Traffic seemed to have run its course after three albums. He started compiling material for an album under his own name. At the last minute, he called in his former bandmates to release the album under the Traffic banner.

That album, John Barleycorn Must Die, ended up nabbing the band their best notices. It prolonged the life of the group for several more years and albums before Traffic finally petered out in 1974. Winwood officially began his solo career at that point.

A New/Old Collaborator

He started to find his solo footing with the 1980 album, Arc Of A Diver. That was the first time he worked with co-writer Will Jennings. Jennings became a trusted collaborator for Steve Winwood’s work in the 80s. That included the artist’s massive resurgence of popularity in 1986 with the album Back In The High Life.

Jennings was still the chief co-writer for Winwood as he set about to make the 1990 album Refugees Of The Heart. By then, some of the momentum of Winwood’s big comeback had stalled a bit. The album sold well below its predecessors.

Nonetheless, it did spin off the single “One And Only Man”, which made it to no. 18 upon its release. Interestingly enough, the bluesy, potent track represented the lone song on the record that Jennings didn’t co-write. Instead, Winwood got back together to write with an old friend from his band days.

Traffic Jam

Jim Capaldi joined Winwood as one of the founding members of Traffic. It was Capaldi who often provided the lyrics to the music composed by Winwood throughout the band’s successful run. “One And Only Man” represented the return of this songwriting partnership for the first time in 13 years.

Capaldi and Winwood also handled all the instrumental duties on the song. Winwood takes center stage with some juicy guitar as well as thrilling work on the Hammond organ. Meanwhile, Capaldi takes care of the churning beat on drums while also adding some other percussion touches to the mix. “One And Only Man” did indeed come off sounding like a 90s approximation of the musical excursions that Traffic took so often back in the day.

In fact, things went so swimmingly that Steve Winwood decided to team up with Capaldi to revive the brand on his next musical project. The 1994 album Far From Home would turn out to be the final one of Traffic’s career. And, as fate would have it, “One And Only Man” would serve as Winwood’s last ever foray to the higher reaches of the US pop charts.

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