“This is heaven”: The band Eric Clapton said was perfect for him
The true mark of any great blues musician is being somewhat of a journeyman. The archetype for what a travelling musician should be is the kind of drifter who walks into any town and can knock the socks off of anyone within earshot within the first few bars of their tunes. Although Eric Clapton is far more content with following in the footsteps of many of his blues idols, he knew it couldn’t get any better than when he was left to his own devices to play whatever he pleased.
Because, really, the last thing that any musician wants is to be tied down to one genre. The industry has always been a glutton for success, but while they might try to have the same results with one hit by making a band play something similar over and over again, ‘Slowhand’ was more interested in being a free agent and seeing wherever his muse would take him next.
It only takes one look at his discography to see why he works best in that environment. Going from The Yardbirds to Cream to Blind Faith to Derek and the Dominoes looks absolutely exhausting on paper, and while all of them do have a trace of blues in their work, Clapton always knew a way to twist his signature Robert Johnson and Muddy Waters licks around to make them sound slightly different.
And as far as his solo career was concerned, Clapton was the kind of seasoned bluesman he always dreamed of being, but that was only one facet of his sound. He had become enamoured with albums by The Band and Bob Dylan, so hearing him take a more rootsy approach to the genre wasn’t far from the kind of acoustic picking Waters was doing on Folk Singer.
But Clapton always reserved something special for when he was a backing musician. He had already delivered one of the best solos that anyone had ever penned on The Beatles’ ‘While My Guitar Gently Weeps’, and while he did end up contributing to albums by everyone from George Harrison to Roger Waters, he was never afraid to spread his love of the blues wherever he went. When he first fell back down to Earth after leaving The Yardbirds, though, working with John Mayall was his version of paradise.
“I realised right away that I was in the perfect environment. He only wanted to play blues.”
Eric Clapton
The Yardbirds had already slowly been inching towards pop music, so having an excuse to play the most blistering rock and roll he could was a dream come true for Clapton, saying, “I realised right away that I was in the perfect environment. He only wanted to play blues. Sometimes it would get a bit jazzy. But he wasn’t impressed by rock’n’roll, he didn’t want to be famous, he just wanted to play clubs and have it be ‘real’. And I thought, this is heaven. I can use all this time now just to study my craft. And that’s what I did for almost three years.”
And as far as his guitar playing is concerned, Bluesbreakers deserved to be ranked among the best in Clapton’s catalogue. There may have been more inspired performances on ‘Layla’ and maybe some more tasteful production on his solo records like Slowhand, but there’s something a bit more ferocious about his performance on a tune like ‘Steppin Out’ that feels particularly unhinged.
But for someone who had spent years in the dark, letting loose on this album was practically Clapton’s version of what his friend George Harrison felt when making All Things Must Pass. Both were geniuses in their own right, but all they needed was the right time and project to show their stuff.
