Welcome Back

Asked to write a Lovin' Spoonful-style song for a television series starring a still-unknown John Travolta, John Sebastian came up with ‘Welcome Back.’ It is wonderfully cheerful good-time music, with delightful harmonies by former members of the Fifth Avenue Band, his younger musical brothers. The song reached No. 1 in the United States.

The album bearing its name followed that huge hit. It seems to have been assembled in a hurry, but plenty of the songs show John's own personality: the nostalgic ‘She's Funny’; ‘You Go Your Way, I'll Go Mine,’ with a touch of ‘Nashville Cats’; ‘One Step Forward, Two Steps Back,’ with its sunny, humorous Caribbean rhythm; and the forceful ‘I Needed Her Most, When I Told Her To Go,’ its harmonica surging through the song. Steve Barri produced it, with future Toto members Jeff Porcaro and David Hungate in the rhythm section. Had John taken more time to make an album with old friends such as Eric Jacobsen, it surely would have turned out even better.