The expanded edition included demos, live and BBC session recordings and a DVD documentary directed by Simon Halfon which featured interviews, behind-the-scenes footage and music videos.

The album features contributions from several notable collaborators, including Noel Gallagher (then of Oasis), who appears playing acoustic guitar on "I Walk on Gilded Splinters", and Steve Winwood (formerly of the Spencer Davis Group and Traffic), who performs on the songs "Woodcutter's Son" and "Pink on White Walls".

Ted Kessler, in his contemporary, May 1995 review for NME, felt that the album was "doggedly retro and straight ahead" – an "old fart rockin' blues record" in the style of Eric Clapton, though with "just enough edge to keep you tuned".

[5] Evelyn McDonnell, in a July 1995 review for Rolling Stone, noted the collaborations with musicians such as Steve Winwood and Noel Gallagher, commenting that "Weller's work supplies the connecting link between several generations of British rock and soul", and that Weller's session band were able to lay down "some admirably funky grooves".

[citation needed] In a retrospective summary for Record Collector in 2008, John Reed commented that "Stanley Road remained the apex of Weller's career in terms of commercial success".