The 1970s singer Eric Clapton never wanted to talk to: “I was scared”
Eric Clapton didn’t always want to be showered with the kind of praise that he did throughout his career.
He did like the idea of being described as one of the almighty gods of guitar when he was first making waves with Cream, but when the tides began turning, he wasn’t about to claim that he was one of the most versatile musicians that the world had ever seen. He was willing to be a spokesman for the blues every single time he made a new record, and that didn’t mean having to cower to what the new class of rock and roll stars had to say every single time they came out of the woodwork.
That’s not to say that ‘Slowhand’ couldn’t appreciate the new school to a certain degree. Some of his peers were the ones who were teaching him where to go next, and even if Cream was the absolute peak of what any musician should want to do, it wasn’t out of the question for him to join forces with members of The Band during The Last Waltz or go in a slightly reggae direction when hearing Bob Marley for the first time.
Even when it came to the blues, there were more than a few kids that Clapton was keeping his eye on. Duane Allman was already like a long-lost brother to him when he began putting together Derek and the Dominos, but everyone, from Stevie Ray Vaughan to Robert Cray to John Mayer, was all on a righteous track as far as he was concerned. All of them seemed to be learning from the lessons that he had to teach, but there were other genres that were more interested in tearing him down as well.
After all, the key to all great rock and roll was about the attitude, and becoming one of the most high-profile legends made Clapton look like the most pompous thing in the world when punk came rushing in. There might have been a few rock stars that got the approval of the punk rock crowd, like Pete Townshend, but at the height of the revolution in 1977, Clapton was mortified at the idea of meeting someone like John Lydon when the Sex Pistols first crash-landed in England.
Lydon wasn’t one to mince words when it came to any band, and even if Clapton could dish out his opinions as well, he knew that the punk legend would have torn him apart, saying, “I’m sure there were people in the middle of it all like Joe Strummer of the Clash who did like the music from before. But I never met Johnny Rotten, and I didn’t want to meet Johnny Rotten.”
“I didn’t want to meet people in confrontation where I’m marked as dead. I was scared. And I’ve never really understood or was motivated by hatred or anger.”
Eric Clapton
But it’s not like the greatest rock and roll music of all time didn’t feel a little bit angry. All the other members of Cream didn’t have to get along most of the time, but even when they were making some of their masterpieces, some of that tension may have fueled their greatest songs, especially when working on their version of ‘Crossroads’ or turning their own tunes inside out whenever they played live.
At the same time, there are also more than a few times when the punk wave stole from the old school as well. A lot of the biggest names at the time were basing their playing off of the blues, and while they weren’t going to play the same legendary solos that Clapton did whenever he performed, you could still trace the same musical roots back to people like Chuck Berry the same way that Clapton had done before.
So even if Clapton was a bit hesitant, he might have had a lot more in common with Lydon than he thought. Johnny Rotten was simply the character that he put on for interviews, and since he could find a way to appreciate albums like Exile on Main St, who’s to say that the king of all the punks couldn’t handle having a bit of fun with one of the best blues disciples that rock had ever seen?
