“Out of seclusion”: The artist that saved Eric Clapton from darkness
Every artist’s journey moves in cycles rather than a linear line. No one can keep up a perfect winning streak every time they make a record, and even when someone’s at the top, it only takes a few bad decisions to lead them back down to the bottom if they aren’t careful. Although Eric Clapton remembered still being on a high in the 1970s, he was at a personal low point until this artist helped bring him back.
But, really, what was there really for ‘Slowhand’ to be worried about? Even if Cream had broken up, he was still being looked at as one of the greatest guitarists to place his hands on the fretboard, and even his other supergroup, Blind Faith, had created tunes that would become fixtures of rock and roll for years to come.
Even though someone can have all the fame they want, it doesn’t matter if there’s no one to share it with. Although Clapton poured his heart out for Patti Boyd when working with Derek and the Dominoes, he had escalated to taking heroin and had become dangerously close to becoming a rock and roll casualty.
Clapton was still on the brink of self-destruction, but Carl Radle couldn’t live with himself watching from afar. This was one of the single greatest musicians coming out of England at the time, and there was no way that he was going to fall prey to a drug problem that would take away his brilliance.
Although Radle had his own personal struggles, Clapton credits him with being the one who helped him form his own outfit, saying, “Carl was like my brother. He brought me out of my seclusion when I was talking heroin after the Dominos broke up. He stayed in touch, and he found Dick Sims and Jamie Oldaker and said this could be our new band. And it was.”
While Radle was instrumental in making Derek and the Dominoes groove, hearing him slide right into place on an album like 461 Ocean Boulevard was exactly what Clapton needed to move forward. The tone may have been a lot softer than normal, but hearing ‘Slowhand’ energised about making music again was all that anyone could have asked for, especially if it meant getting more bluesy licks sprinkled throughout the mix.
Radle deserves a spot in rock and roll history for helping Clapton, but he couldn’t manage to clean up his act, either, eventually passing away in 1980 due to an overdose. Clapton would later regret how he couldn’t reach out to his friend when he passed on, saying, “I was doing two bottles of brandy a day, and I couldn’t lift a finger to help anybody. Now I look at it all and see what a waste and what a great player he was, and I’m sad.”
Even if the world doesn’t know the name Carl Radle as well as Clapton’s, he is instrumental in making Clapton into a solo superstar. He could have retired after ‘Layla’ and still been considered a legend, but the countless solo songs he had wouldn’t have been possible without someone pulling him out of the darkness.
