Cream: the fiercest rhythm section in music history
The foundation of any good rock band usually comes down to the rhythm section. Although the guitarist and the singer of any band usually get the lion’s share of the praise, no band can truly groove unless someone is holding down the low end for every single track, providing just the right heartbeat for every song. While many of the 1960s acts were unrivalled in terms of swing, Cream would boast one of the most infamously volatile relationships with Jack Bruce and Ginger Baker.
Before they had even formed Cream, it wasn’t clear that Bruce and Baker would be playing strictly rock and roll. While working in the London club scene, both men had earned their keep making music that fluctuated between genres, spanning blues and jazz in equal measure.
After working together in the Graham Bond Organisation, the duo would later see the biggest success of their career working alongside Eric Clapton. Fresh out of his time working in The Yardbirds, Clapton would later recall choosing Bruce and Baker because he wanted to be challenged by their playing, not wanting to be confined to the tired blues textures that he had been used to.
For all of the promise the band had as a creative entity, the only problem was the personal differences. Before Cream had even gotten together, Baker had already not liked how Bruce conducted himself onstage, going so far as to break out a knife during one of the band meetings.
As Bruce’s son Malcolm would later recall, this meeting would be the moment that Bruce walked away from the Graham Bond Organisation, saying, “I think my dad fired my dad from Graham Bond at knifepoint, famously. But then they got back together for Cream, and they didn’t kill each other even then”.
Then again, the firing was far from the first time the pair had become heated with each other. During one gig, when Baker didn’t take a liking to Bruce’s playing, he threw a drumstick in his direction, after which the bass player picked up his double bass and threw it behind the drums, leading to them having to be separated after the gig was finished.
Even though they may have been fierce towards each other, they were always joined at the hip whenever they performed. While Clapton was slowly emerging as the soon-to-be guitar god, Baker and Bruce were already virtuosos in their own right, with Baker playing swinging drum solos while Bruce approached his bass like a lead guitar on songs like ‘Crossroads’.
While that volatility would ultimately lead to the demise of Cream, it wouldn’t be the last time they would work together, returning to their psychedelic outfit for a handful of reunion shows in the 2000s. Despite the turbulent times working together in the 1960s, Malcolm maintains that there was never one true villain in the scenario.
When talking about their relationship, Malcolm maintained the fact that the duo just had a clash of personalities, explaining, “I saw them together getting on fine, and I saw them not speaking…They were layered people with stuff going on. Addiction, creativity, personal stuff, like we all do”. Even if the band may have been chaotic behind the scenes, that didn’t stop them from turning the music world inside out.
