Scaggs remained a critics' darling over the course of LPs like 1972's My Time and 1974's Slow Dancer, but he did not achieve a commercial breakthrough until 1976's Silk Degrees, which reached number two on the album charts while spawning the Top Three single 'Lowdown,' as well as the smash 'Lido Shuffle.' 1977's Down Two Then Left was also a success, and 1980's Middle Man reached the Top Ten on the strength of the singles 'Breakdown Dead Ahead' and 'Jo Jo.'

However, Scaggs spent much of the 1980s in retirement, owning and operating the San Francisco nightclub Slim's and limiting his performances primarily to the club's annual black-tie New Year's Eve concerts. Finally, in 1988 he resurfaced with the album Other Roads, followed three years later by a tour with Donald Fagen's Rock and Soul Revue. The solo Some Change appeared in 1994, with Come on Home and My Time: The Anthology (1969-1997) both released in 1997. The newly energized Scaggs spent the next few years consistantly releasing new material including Here's the Low Down, Fade into Light, Dig and a collection of standards called But Beautiful.