[2] Capaldi also performed with Jimi Hendrix, Eric Clapton, George Harrison, Alvin Lee, Cat Stevens, and Mylon LeFevre, and wrote lyrics for other artists, such as "Love Will Keep Us Alive" and "This is Reggae Music".

As a child, Capaldi studied piano and voice with his father, a music teacher, and by his teens he was playing drums with his friends.

They played gigs in Birmingham and the surrounding Black Country area; former Yardbirds manager Giorgio Gomelsky offered them a recording contract.

Back in Birmingham Capaldi would occasionally join his friends Mason, Winwood, and Chris Wood for after-hours impromptu performances at The Elbow Room club on Aston High Street.

The new band was signed by Island Records and rented a quiet cottage in Aston Tirrold, Berkshire, to write and rehearse new material.

They then toured the UK and the US with an expanded line-up, which would go on to produce the hit albums Welcome to the Canteen and The Low Spark of High Heeled Boys.

In addition, "Rock and Roll Stew (part 1)", a rare instance of a Traffic song with Capaldi on lead vocal, was a minor hit in the US.

This set contained a broad variety of musical styles and featured contributions from Free guitarist Paul Kossoff, the Muscle Shoals Rhythm Section, and several members of Traffic.

It was well received by critics and proved to be a modest success in the US, encouraging Capaldi to pursue a solo career alongside his work with Traffic.

After two more albums with Traffic, the group took a short break, allowing Capaldi to record Whale Meat Again, which was slightly less successful than his debut both in terms of reviews and sales.

The title track was a thoroughly hard rocking and unapologetic environmentalist tirade; aggressive sociopolitical-themed songs became a recurring theme in Capaldi's work.

He began work on his third solo album, Short Cut Draw Blood, alongside recording When the Eagle Flies with Traffic.

"Shoe Shine", which combined disco rhythms and melodies with an angry lead vocal and lyrics about poverty and destitution, reached number 11 in France[12] and also entered Billboard's Dance Music/Club Play Singles chart.

[13] However, despite including both hard rockers such as "Elixir of Life" and "Hotel Blues" and laments such as "Short Ends" and "Wild Geese" alongside the disco-flavoured numbers, Capaldi retained no fondness for his two albums with RSO, later saying "frankly, they got buried under a pile of disco.

The albums were evenly split between mellow pop and embittered hard rock, with "Success" sporting a morbid before/after cover, and some tracks incorporated a Latin influence from Capaldi's new home, Brazil.

However, though "Child in the Storm" reached number 75 in the Netherlands,[14] there was nothing resembling a major hit, not even the folk arrangement of Traffic's "The Low Spark of High-Heeled Boys".

The album Let the Thunder Cry was released in Brazil by Young/RGE in early 1981 and spawned two big hits there: "Old Photographs", a cover version of "Casinha branca" originally recorded by Gilson in 1979; and "Favella Music".

He would not record another solo album for well over a decade, though a greatest hits compilation, Prince of Darkness, was released in 1995 and made the charts in the Netherlands.

[20] He was a five times winner of BMI/Ascap Awards for the "most played compositions in America", and sales of songs written or co-written by him exceeded 25 million units.

[citation needed] In 2001, Capaldi's eleventh solo album Living on the Outside featured George Harrison, Steve Winwood, Paul Weller, Gary Moore, and Ian Paice.

George Harrison played guitar on the track "Anna Julia", an English translation of a song by the Brazilian band Los Hermanos.

Capaldi married Brazilian-born Aninha E S Campos in 1975 in All Saints Church, Marlow [23] and in 1976 toured with his band Space Cadets before moving to Brazil in 1977.

He did a lot of charitable work for organisations in Brazil, such as the Associação Beneficiente São Martinho street children's charity in Lapa, Rio de Janeiro, which the LSS also supported between 1994 and 2001.

Guests included Bill Wyman (Rolling Stones), Jon Lord (Deep Purple), Gary Moore (Thin Lizzy), Steve Winwood (Traffic), Cat Stevens (aka Yusuf Islam), Joe Walsh (The Eagles), Paul Weller (The Jam), Pete Townshend (The Who), Jim's brother Phil, and many more.

The ideas of a boxed set and lyrics book had been conceived by Capaldi shortly before he died, and their releases were prepared by his widow in fulfilment of a last promise to him.