This was the first cassette tape I ever bought with my own money.Around the age of 11, my brother had begun taking guitar lessons and started a quest of finding the best guitarists to emulate. Though I hadn't yet picked up an instrument of my own, I was already an avid music fan, so I shared my brother's enthusiasm for finding new players/groups to check out. Of course, Eric Clapton ranked pretty high on almost every one's recommendation list.
So Chris (my brother) bought a cassette single of "Bad Love" off of Clapton's Journeyman album. We wore that thing into the ground, rewinding and replaying it for hours as we did our homework after school. It's just an incredible song. Clapton's guitar work was everything we had heard it would be (SIDEBAR: Phil Collin's drumming on that track is also artwork in and of itself), and we were instant fans.
Chris later tracked down some of Clapton's earlier group work - namely The Very Best of Cream and the Blind Faith album (I had to draw a black t-shirt over the topless girl on the cover so as not to freak our mom out). Blind Faith didn't have much appeal then, since there weren't any rockin' guitar solos, though I rediscovered the album once my ears had matured a bit. The Cream tape was great though. It's hard to imagine some of those sounds are actually coming out of a guitar.
A while after, I had a birthday coming up and was allowed to pick out a cassette tape as a present at our local mall music store. As I scanned the tape racks (not yet in the market for those new-fangled CDs), I stumbled across this album. An actual Cream album, not just an incongruous selection of cuts. Thanks to the Greatest Hits tape, I was already familiar with songs like "Sunshine of Your Love" and "Strange Brew", but "Tales of Brave Ulysses" (which I hadn't heard since it was only available on the Greatest Hits CD, not the tape) quickly became my new fave song of all time. "Blue Condition" was another favorite, with Ginger Baker's sloppy, cockney vocals making that track jump off the album.
There was obviously some psychedelic influence creeping into the blues-based trio around this time. I was entranced by the subdued, almost eerie vibe to "World of Pain" and "Dance the Night Away". The slow, intense build of "We're Going Wrong" still gives me chills every time I hear it. And "Mother's Lament" is just brilliantly hilarious.
"Outside Woman Blues" also became a staple in my live set. If you've seen me play live more than once, chances are you've heard this song, though my rendition is a hybrid of Clapton's take and the original version.
This album was a major influence on me creatively, and it was also one of my major inspirations for learning bass. Jack Bruce's approach, attack, and note selection were always the target I was aiming for as a young bassist. His tone... not so much. These Cream albums weren't recorded very well, and personally, I think the remastered versions that came out in the 90's sound even worse. Clapton's guitars were already ridiculously high in the mix, and the bass and Baker's drums were barely audible on a few tracks... the remastered versions only amplify these problems.
I'd love to hear an entire remix of this, if it were ever possible. Chances are the only thing they have to work with are 2-track masters, but I still often wonder what it would sound like to have these redone by one of the Lord-Alge brothers.
Fun tidbit... the day I bought this cassette, the guy at the checkout counter asked me if I liked this new band Pearl Jam. I told him I had no idea who they were. He informed me the guy in line ahead of me paid for their new CD, Ten and forgot to take it with him. It was mine if I wanted it. I didn't have a CD player (and wouldn't even know anyone who owned one for a few years), so I declined. It was about a year later when the video for "Even Flow" broke on MTV and I wholeheartedly regretted my decision.
Don't own this album yet? Listen and buy it here:
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