The Cream song Jack Bruce was pissed off recording: “The wrong tune throughout”
Being in any kind of power trio is a massive tightrope to walk half the time. Even though everyone has to hold up their end of the bargain for everything to sound good, there are always moments where someone seems to either be pulling more of their weight than they should or starts getting agitated when people draw attention to one member of the band more than everyone else. But while many power trios can set their egos aside for the sake of the song, Cream was always a powder keg waiting to go off.
Before they had even played a note of music, every band member was already a virtuoso. Eric Clapton was slowly turning into one of the most in-demand musicians to come out of the blues scene, and whereas Jack Bruce and Ginger Baker came from the world of jazz, they could still create a groove that sounded like a freight train barrelling down a hill at a thousand miles an hour.
The only slight snag in their plan was the fact that they both couldn’t stand each other. In fact, the reason why the band nearly broke up before they got started was that both of them refused to work together, but once they heard how much potential was there on tunes like ‘I Feel Free,’ it was hard for them to deny what they had on their hands.
And with Fresh Cream, all the groundwork for their sound was already there. This was the first time that Bruce had showcased his massive pipes on tracks like ‘Spoonful,’ but now that Clapton was in the mix, hearing both of them bounce off each other during songs and stretch out into freeform jams whenever they played live was like watching musical Olympians go back and forth.
Since Bruce was writing a lot of songs, though, there was bound to be trouble when splitting up royalties. ‘Sunshine of Your Love’ may have been one of their best tracks, but Disraeli Gears marked a point where they needed to switch things up a bit more. And for producer Felix Pappalardi, that meant taking the crux of their cover of ‘Lawdy Mama’ and turning it into ‘Strange Brew’ to kick off the record.
“It still pisses me off because it sounds like the bass is playing the wrong tune throughout”
jack bruce
It’s not like the producer didn’t have a point, but Bruce was absolutely furious that he wasn’t told that the song had been changed, saying, “I was well pissed off because the bass part that I had didn’t fit the new structure of this new song, although it was used. It still pisses me off because it sounds like the bass is playing the wrong tune throughout – which it wasn’t for the original thing. It was very much against my wishes, but I had absolutely no power in the band, in the studio.”
But making Clapton the singer of the first song was a case of the record company knowing what the people wanted to hear. Every member of the band was an absolute monster at what they did, but to keep things democratic, it was important to keep ‘Slowhand’ front and centre during a lot of their classics so that everyone got to listen to the man behind those impressive blues licks.
Even if there are a few bum notes on the final product, the bassline of ‘Strange Brew’ is far from something to be ashamed of. There might be a handful of times where things sound a bit bizarre, but considering the whole song was about capturing the feeling of what the blues scene was like in the 1960s, having a few moments where things sound out of place is the best approach.
