As I've been posting, I've been listening to ALOT of Cream & Jack Bruce
lately. I've repurchased the entire core Cream catalog in hi-res (&
played most of it), Been listening to the Bruce 50th Birthday complete
in my car almost non stop, & last night for the first time in years
played one of the reunion cd's.

Damn, Cream was amazing! (as an aside, I wish Bruce & Gary Moore
would have done more work together also & incorporated some of
Moore's rocker's into the mix).

I also just finished watching the over 4 hour 2 dvd 50th set, & started
the Cream Final Concert dvd, which is what caused me to start this
thread. Until watching the 45 minute Cream Final 60's concert, I'd
forgotten how Amazing Clapton ONCE was. I even mentioned regarding the
BBM section of the Bruce DVD set that Gary Moore was just as good in
1993 as EC was in 1969. I neglected one difference: Clapton wrote the
guitar parts. Moore was mostly doing an amazing job of covering them,
though he did add a significant amount of his own licks.

The point of this thread is WTF happened to Clapton? This is a man who
quit the Yardbirds because For Your Love was too commercial, & 10 years
later was releasing such pop pap as Lay Down Sally & I Shot The Sheriff;
& it was almost all downhill from there.

My opinion will definitely differ here from that of others:

IMO Clapton was God in the original Cream; Was extremely good with
Mayall & Blind Faith; was better then average with the Yardbirds, & then
started going downhill with Derek & The Dominoes & ended up as boring
as Olivia Neutron Bomb.

I like EC Was Here alot. I also like the Rush Soundtrack (an obscure
blues release from the early 90's that was mostly EC).

I like (but don't love) Derek & The D's - Layla (a few great songs, but
I find the album as a whole a bit boring, & don't really like the DD
live album all that much), the solo debut, 24 Nights, Live With Winwood
& Just One Night & that's about it.

From Slowhand on, imo he largely sucks. (I know Slowhand & a couple
other albums from that period are hugely popular; I still don't like
them much).

What happened for me was that other than the Cream reunion,
Rush was the last time I heard EC play like he meant it. Again,
until watching "Cream The Final Concert", I had forgotten how great
of a player this man once was.

What happened? It can't have been just getting sober; if anything my
playing as a rocker improved when I went 100% clean & sober; though I
was never even close to being in EC's (or Moore's) league.

What happened?? EC after Blind Faith largely bores me to tears.

While Bruce just kept getting better & better until he got really old.
He stumbled musically for a few years, but after hooking up with Kip
Hanrahan, Gary Moore, Leslie West & Robin Trower definitely found
his post-Cream path. (the last album wasn't all that good, but I believe
the man was dying when it was recorded)

Drugs (heroin)
Alcohol (large volumes)
Women ( see line above)
Money (see above the above)
Changing trends in music

I think about Clapton along the same lines as you do, save for your opinion of Layla... . It has been, and remains, one of my all-time favorite albums. I think early on in his career Clapton was driven and played as if his life depended on it. Once he was on his own he simply did not possess the same fire. He's certainly not alone in this. Aside from The Beatles, he was my first music idol, and thus will always have a special place in my heart. He's made some decent music since the 70's, but he sure has also done a lot of mediocre to bad stuff.

As for Bruce, I believe he may be the most underrated performer of his generation. Don't forget his work with The Golden Palominos, Michael Mantler, and several other one-offs. He really was a great talent.

Although I disagree about Derek & The Dominos...my favorite Clapton record (and I love their live album)...I'm on board with most of your other statements (without going so far as saying that some of those albums "suck"). I came to his music in 1980 when I was 14, around the time "Just One Night" came out and quickly went back to hear Cream, D&tD's and his early solo work. I actually like a lot of his '70s records but I don't find them jaw-dropping or inspiring the way his earlier records were. I think all of ranasakawa's explanations are valid, and I'll also add Clapton's discovery of The Band as a major reason for the change in his musical approach. I love The Band but their influence seemed to steer him away from virtuosity and into collaborative songwriting. Instead of combining the two which would have been the logical move, I get the sense that he purposely tried to negate the "Clapton Is God" perception by blending in with the crowd. There have been exceptions like "From The Cradle," where his playing is fierce & passionate, but money & Armani suits pretty much permanently altered his career.

I think it's also unrealistic to expect an artist to retain that "fire" for 50 years. There are very few artists who can maintain the standards they set early in their careers when they were full of fire and fresh ideas. Like you, I lose interest after Slowhand, but I love everything before that. That's a nice run of 15 years or so. Nothing wrong with that.

I'm hoping he shows a little fire at his 70th Birthday bash at MSG.

I've always enjoyed seeing Clapton live, so that should be great.

People change. Musicians change. Their styles, likes and dislikes change. Eric is no different from anyone else. He might have done Cream-like music for the last 47 years. People would then be commenting and asking "Can't this guy do anything that's different? He's doing a cheap imitation of what he did back in the 1960s." I take his and everyone's music for what it is. I love Cream. I love The Dominos. I great enjoy all or most of his music since then. It's not Cream though and not meant to be.

I just don't like smooth pop; & the man once showed such amazing talent. I think alot of my point was while Bruce's style changed (Repeatedly; if you listen to the Hanrahan cd's, Bruce went WAY OUT THERE at times), his talent level & musical integrity never dropped. IMO, Clapton' has lost alot in both areas.

How do you define "musical integrity"?

Music that stays well within the bounds of tegrity.

Thank you sir.

I hope so too.........I'm going to one of them.

But the last 3 times I've seen him.......both MSG shows with Jeff Beck and one MSG with Steve Winwood, he was boring.

Smiff's right.

Bob Dylan is putting out better records at this stage than Clapton......sure, since Desire, his "fire" has flickered on and off, but most everything from Time Out Of Mind onward has been great/really good.......(save for his XMas record).

I use the Christmas CD to scare children at Halloween.

I think the J.J. Cale style of music was simply what he wanted to do after a certain point.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/musi ... -days.html