Dear Mr. Fantasy

This funky cover of Traffic's (Steve Winwood) classic features hip-hop icon Lyrics Born in the role of Mr. Fantasy. With his smooth virtuosity, LB expands rap swagger to include "helping to repair the human tapestry." It was a full-circle moment for him to join Lisa B at Oakland's Pajama Studios, where Lyrics Born recorded most of his debut record "The Album" by Latyrx (1997) — with engineer Jim (James) Gardiner once again at the soundboard almost 3 decades later (see Gardiner reflected in the vocal booth window shown above while Lyrics Born lays down his rap and improvs). Lisa's new version targets the fake vs. the real Mr. Fantasy — the charlatan destroyer vs. we the people unfurling a vision of personal and collective freedom. Joining the two LBs are Ben Flint on keyboards (who toured with Isaac Hayes for over a decade), Curtis Ohlson on bass (who cut his teeth in Ray Charles's band), guitarist Garth Webber (who played in the bands of Miles Davis, Gregg Allman, Boz Scaggs, and Bob Weir, among many others), and widely in-demand drummer Jeff Marrs.