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Eric Clapton has been my favorite guitarist since I started listening to classic rock a lot and I have amassed quite a few of his CD’s both as a solo artist and as a members of his other bands like Cream, Derek and the Dominoes and Blind Faith. I have been listening to him a lot lately so I decided to start reviewing the CD’s and where better to start than here, his first major group after the Yardbirds.
The History
Eric Clapton was in the Yardbirds starting from about 1964 when they were still primarily a blues band. However, with the success of the Beatles people realized they could make a lot of money making pop songs so the Yardbirds, perhaps swayed by dollar signs in their eyes (or pound signs I guess?), temporarily abandoned the blues in order to make it big. “For Your Love” was the result of this and although Eric Clapton played on that song and first pop album, he knew it wasn’t for him and left. He wanted to be a blues player and eventually found his way into John Mayall’s blues band, the Bluesbreakers. The Bluesbreakers had a revolving roster but Mayall was always the constant. He sang, played the piano, harmonica and organs. At this time he was supplemented by John McVie (the “MAC” of Fleetwood Mac) on bass and Hughie Flint on drums. Eric Clapton joined in on guitar and they made only one album together.
The Album
The album contained 12 songs but is a brisk 38 minutes in length. They start things off with a raucaous rendition Otis Dixon’s All Your Love. Eric Clapton starts off his guitar heroics right off the bat with this song and it hardly lets up the rest of the way on the record. They follow that up with an absolutely awesome version of Hideaway where Clapton wails on the guitar and show why he was dubbed “God” at the time.
They follow up with two rather short songs, Little Girl and Another Man. Little Girl is an uptempo bluesy number with the usual guitar playing going on. Another Man is the John Mayall showcase of the record with him singing and playing the mouth harp with no rhythm but handclaps to keep him going.
Double Crossing Time is the next track up and it’s weird to listen too as the bass/drums and organ are mixed totally to the right, the vocals in the middle and Eric’s lead guitar alone on the left. Eric whips a pretty decent solo out of a badly mixed song to salvage it somewhat though. They raise the energy (and mixing talent) up a notch on What’d I Say which has a drum solo that seemed to last just a few bars too long and some more nice Clapton playing. The end of the song is notable for quoting the Beatle’s “Daytripper” almost exactly, but I’m sure that the riff was used before in old blues songs.
Key to Love follows as our 7th track and is augmented with some saxaphones and is a very catchy song that was written by Mayall himself. Eric gives one of the best solos on the album, which is saying something, and this song is definitely a hidden gem that most don’t remember the record for (usually it’s Hideaway or All Your Love that are on the Clapton compilations). We go from one of my favorite songs to Parchman Farm which was one of my least favorites. I don’t know why, it just never caught my fancy. It’s another Mayall showcase piece as he sings and plays harmonica with no other person except the drummer joining in on the song.
We next go to the longest track on the album (clocking in at 5:54!) and it’s called Have You Heard. It’s a slow blues song that’s accompanied by various horns and some choice Clapton guitar playing thrown in between the singing but a pretty midling solo performance if I must say so myself. The next song would become a Clapton staple for years to come has he played it live during much of the 70’s and he even recorded a version himself years later. It’s called Ramblin’ on My Mind and Eric would definitely record better versions released over the years but as a first try it’s not bad. He even got to sing on the track which I believe makes it the first appearance of him singing on any record.
The disc is rounded out by a rocking rendition of Stepping Out and an uptempo number called It Ain’t Right. Steppin’ Out is another song that I believe Eric would also record later (of course, I have no research materials in front of me so I’m going off memory here) and it isn’t too bad. It Ain’t Right is the typical uptempo blues song featured on the record and wasn’t a bad choice of closing song.
The Liner Notes
At four pages long, it’s not much. The first is the cover, the inside cover has the track listing with musicians featured on the record. The next page has three black and white photos of the band and the start of an essay written by Neil Slaven around the time the album was released and was probably featured on the back of the album sleeve. It continues to the last page and that’s it.
Overall Review
What can I say, fans of Eric Clapton’s work have to pick up this record. It’s where he got his start and the seeds were laid down for all his future works. You can tell from this early recording that Eric was something special and would go on to achieve fame no other blues player could imagine. It is certainly not his greatest playing but for his first real shot at blues playing and for the period it was released, there were none better. Clapton fans should pick this one up. Casual Clapton fans might not like this record too much as the production and mixing aren’t quite what they are today and aren’t even up to snuff with his Cream work that would follow right after this. For blues fans, it’s not a bad record to own. Mayall has a great blues voice in my opinion and most of the songs are very blues based and would be enjoyed.
Overall Rating:
6.0
Favorite Song: Hideaway
Favorite Solo: All Your Love
Least Favorite: Parchman Farm
Hidden Gem: Key To Love
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