Song of the Day 8/4: Dave Mason and the Quarantines, “Feelin’ Alright”

One thing that’s made the pandemic the teensiest bit more bearable: The scores, or hundreds, of musicians recording from quarantine and posting the results to YouTube. Dave Mason, who wrote this song for Traffic’s debut album in 1968, contacted a bunch of other old dudes — Mick Fleetwood, Sammy Hagar, and several Doobie Brothers, including Michael McDonald — for a Zoom-era jam session.

The song was released as Traffic’s first single, but it only reached No. 133 in the US. Compared to most of its later covers, you can hear why –it’s rather lifeless compared with how it’s sounded ever since.

Even Joe Cocker’s iconic cover only reached No. 33 on its second try, in 1972, after stalling at No. 69 in 1969. Yet if you go by how often it’s been covered, it’s undeniably a standard. Within three years of its release it was recorded by acts as diverse as Grand Funk Railroad (No. 54 in 1971), Lulu and Lou Rawls. Mongo Santamaria also scraped the bottom of the charts (no. 95) with his 1969 single.

And before you laugh at the mention of Lulu, her take on it a lot funkier than you might guess.

The song appealed especially to soul singers and funk/R&B bands — Isaac Hayes, David Ruffin, Gladys Knight, the Jackson 5, Rare Earth, the Chairmen of the Board, the Ohio Players, among others. Here’s the Bar-Kays dressing it up with a few extra chord changes (there are only two chords in the actual song) on the horn break.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uTPiJWp8Byg