Cream

Cream were a classic 1960s British rock band, which consisted of guitarist Eric Clapton, bassist Jack Bruce and drummer Ginger Baker. Celebrated as one of the first great power trios and supergroups of rock, their sound was characterised by a melange of blues, pop and psychedelia. They also laid down the foundations for heavy metal music, and inspired several generations of bands from Black Sabbath and Van Halen to The Smashing Pumpkins. Cream combined Clapton’s blues guitar playing with the airy voice and intense basslines of Jack Bruce and the jazz-influenced drumming of Ginger Baker. Between 1966 and 1968 they sold over 15 million albums world wide.

Cream’s music included songs based on traditional blues such as “Crossroads” and “Spoonful”, and modern blues such as “Born Under a Bad Sign”, as well as more eccentric songs such as “Strange Brew”, “Tales of Brave Ulysses” and “Toad”. Cream’s biggest hits were “I Feel Free”, “Sunshine of Your Love”, “White Room”, “Crossroads”, and “Badge”.

Cream, together with The Who, made a significant impact upon the popular music of the time providing a heavy yet technically proficient musical theme that foreshadowed the emergence of bands like Led Zeppelin in the late 1960s and Rush in the 1970s. The band’s live performances influenced progressive rock acts and other jam bands, including the Grateful Dead, Phish, and even Black Sabbath. Although Cream’s studio work has stood the test of time, their true influence lies in their live set. Cream took the idea of jamming to a whole new level incorporating their jazz background into their long 20 minute jams influencing bands like Led Zeppelin, the Jeff Beck Group and the Allman Brothers Band.

History

Formation

Cream’s beginnings can be traced back to 1966. By that time, Eric Clapton — whose career had begun in The Yardbirds and continued with John Mayall & The Bluesbreakers — had established a reputation as one of the premier blues guitarists in Britain. Clapton’s virtuosity and raw power with the instrument inspired one fan to spray paint the words “Clapton is God” on the wall of an Islington underground station. Contrary to the popular myth, “Clapton is God” slogans did not appear all over London but only on that wall. Clapton, however, found the stoic environment of Mayall’s band confining, and sought to expand his playing in a new band.

In 1966, Clapton met Baker, then the leader of the Graham Bond Organisation, which at one point featured Jack Bruce as bassist, but who also played harmonica and piano. Baker, too, felt stifled in the GBO, and grew tired of Graham Bond’s drug addictions and bouts of mental instability. Baker had met Clapton after a gig (during Clapton’s time with the Yardbirds). “I had always liked Ginger,” explained Clapton. “Ginger had come to see me play with John Mayall. After the gig he drove me back to London in his Rover. I was very impressed with his car and driving. He was telling me that he wanted to start a band, and I had been thinking about it too.”; each was impressed with the other’s playing abilities, prompting Baker to ask Clapton to join his new, then-unnamed group. Clapton immediately said yes, but only on one condition: that Baker hire Jack Bruce as the group’s bassist.

Clapton had met Bruce when the bassist/vocalist did a short stint with the Bluesbreakers in March 1966; the two had also worked together as part of a one-shot band called Powerhouse (which also included Steve Winwood and Paul Jones). Impressed with his vocals and technical prowess, Clapton had wanted to work with Bruce on an ongoing basis.

What Clapton did not know was that while Bruce was in Bond’s band, he and Baker had been notorious for their quarreling. While both were excellent jazz musicians and respected each other’s skills, the confines of the GBO had proved too small for their egos. Their volatile relationship included on-stage fights and the sabotaging of one another’s instruments. After Baker fired Bruce from the band, Bruce continued to arrive for gigs; ultimately, Bruce was driven away from the band after Baker threatened him at knifepoint.

Nevertheless, Baker and Bruce were able to put aside their differences for the good of Baker’s new trio, which he envisioned as collaborative, with each of the members contributing to music and lyrics. The band was named “Cream,” as Clapton, Bruce, and Baker were already considered the “cream of the crop” amongst blues and jazz musicians in the exploding British music scene. Before deciding upon “Cream,” the band considered calling themselves “Sweet ‘n’ Sour Rock ‘n’ Roll.” Of the trio, Clapton had the biggest reputation in England; however, he was all but unknown in the United States. He left The Yardbirds before “For Your Love” hit the American Top Ten.

Shortly after the band’s formation in 1966, Cream received an invitation to perform at the July 1966 “Winsdor Jazz & Blues Festival”. The band hardly being a month old and with few original songs to their credit, Cream performed spirited blues reworkings that thrilled the large crowd and earned them a warm reception. They also got a chance to jam with Jimi Hendrix. Hendrix was a fan of Eric Clapton, and wanted a chance to play with him onstage. Hendrix was introduced to Cream through former Animal Chas Chandler.

It was during the early organization that it was decided Bruce would serve as the group’s lead vocalist. While Clapton was shy about singing, he occasionally harmonized with Bruce, and as he grew as a singer, would take lead vocals on some notable Cream tunes including “Four Until Late,” “Strange Brew,” “Crossroads,” and “Badge.”

Recording Years (1966-1968)

Fresh Cream

Cream’s debut album, Fresh Cream, was recorded and released in 1966. The album reached #6 in the UK charts and #39 in the United States. It mainly consisted of blues covers including “Four Until Late,” “Rollin’ And Tumblin’,” “Spoonful,” “I’m So Glad,” and “Cat’s Squirrel,” an instrumental. The rest of the album featured songs written (or co-written) by Jack Bruce, most notably “Wrapping Paper” and “I Feel Free” (which was a UK hit single, but only released on the American edition of the LP) and a couple of songs written by Ginger Baker (one of which, “Toad”, contained one of the earliest examples of a drum solo in rock music).

The early Cream bootlegs show that the band had not developed their signature jamming capabilities. These recordings capture a much tighter band showcasing more songs. All of the songs are reasonably short 5 minute versions of “N.S.U.,” “Spoonful,” and “Toad”.

Disraeli Gears

Cream’s second album, Disraeli Gears, was released in November 1967 and reached the Top 5 in the charts on both sides of the Atlantic. It was recorded at Atlantic Studios in New York. Disraeli Gears is often considered to be the band’s defining effort, successfully blending psychedelic British rock with American blues. It was also the first Cream album to consist primarily of original songs, with only three of the eleven tracks written by others outside the band. Disraeli Gears not only features hits “Strange Brew” and “Tales of Brave Ulysses,” but also “Sunshine of Your Love,” arguably Cream’s most popular song.

During late 1967, they incorporated more jamming time in each song, sometimes stretching out to 20 minutes. According to Jack Bruce, they were obligated to play 20 minute jams or the audience would angrily ask for their money back. Nonetheless, songs like “Sunshine of Your Love,” “Crossroads,” and “Tales of Brave Ulysses” remained reasonably short, the latter being the band’s signature opener until “White Room” took its place in mid-1968. The band would also do a 45 minute opus of songs capturing a medley of “Steppin’ Out” (showcasing Eric Clapton), “Traintime” (showcasing Jack Bruce’s harmonica) and “Toad” (Ginger Baker’s tour-de-force drum solo), and they would usually go straight into “I’m So Glad” for an encore. This remained their signature closer.

Wheels of Fire

In 1968 came Cream’s third release, Wheels of Fire, which topped the American charts. It also featured three live recordings from the Winterland Ballroom and one from the Fillmore. The opening song, “White Room,” became a popular radio staple. Another song, “Politician,” was reportedly written by the band while waiting to perform live at the BBC. The 16 minute “Spoonful” from their March Winterland show, became their most epic song and a concert favourite.

After the completion of Wheels of Fire in mid-1968, the band members had had enough and wanted to go their separate ways. As Baker would state in a 2006 interview with Music Mart magazine, “It just got to the point where Eric said to me: ‘I’ve had enough of this,’ and I said so have I. I couldn’t stand it. The last year with Cream was just agony. It’s damaged my hearing permanently, and today I’ve still got a hearing problem because of the sheer volume throughout the last year of Cream. But it didn’t start off like that. In 1966, it was great. It was really a wonderful experience musically, and it just went into the realms of stupid.” Also, Bruce and Baker’s combustible relationship proved even worse as a result of the strain put upon the band by non-stop touring, forcing Clapton to play the perpetual role of peacekeeper.

Clapton had also fallen under the spell of Bob Dylan’s former backing group, now known as The Band and their debut album, Music from Big Pink, which proved to be a welcome breath of fresh air in comparison to the incense and psychedelia that had informed Cream. Furthermore, he had read a scathing Cream review in Rolling Stone magazine, a publication he had much admired, where the reviewer, Jon Landau called him a master of “the blues cliché.” It was in the wake of that article that Clapton wanted to end Cream and pursue a different musical direction.

Goodbye

Cream was eventually persuaded to do one final album. That album, the appropriately titled Goodbye, was recorded in late 1968 and released in spring of 1969, after the band had already broken up . It featured six songs; three live recordings dating from a concert at The Forum in Los Angeles, California on the 19th of October, and three new studio recordings (the most notable,”Badge,” was written by Clapton and George Harrison, who also played rhythm guitar). “I’m So Glad,” which first appeared as a studio recording on Fresh Cream, appeared as a live track on Goodbye. It was the only song to appear on both Cream’s first and last album.

Their management persuaded them to do one final tour to promote their new album. This “farewell tour” consisted of 22 shows at 19 venues in the United States between October 4 and November 4, 1968, and two final farewell concerts at the Royal Albert Hall on November 26, 1968. Initially another double album was planned comprising live material from this tour plus new studio tracks, but a single album, Goodbye was released instead with three live tracks taken from their performance at The Forum in Los Angeles on October 19, 1968, and three studio tracks, one written by each of the band members. It was not until May 2007 when Woodstock Tapes released The Farewell Tour 1968 that consists nine tracks recorded at Inglewood Forum. The final United States gig was at the Rhode Island Auditorium, November 4th, 1968.

The two Royal Albert Hall concerts were filmed for a BBC documentary and released on video (and later DVD) as Farewell Concert. Both shows were sold out and attracted more attention than any other Cream concert, but their performance was regarded by many as below standard. Baker himself said of the concerts: “It wasn’t a good gig … Cream was better than that … We knew it was all over. We knew we were just finishing it off, getting it over with.” Cream’s live performances were already declining, in an interview from Cream: Classic Artists, Ginger Baker himself agreed that the band was getting worse by the minute. Cream’s supporting acts were Taste (featuring a young Rory Gallagher) and the newly formed Yes, who received good reviews.

Later years (1968-present)

Inspired by more song-based acts, particularly The Band, Clapton went on to perform much different, less improvisational material with Delaney & Bonnie, Blind Faith with Baker, Derek and the Dominos, and in his own long and varied solo career. Blind Faith came about immediately after the demise of Cream following an attempt by Clapton to recruit Steve Winwood into the band in the hope that he would help act as a buffer between Bruce and Baker. However, Cream broke up before Winwood had the chance to consider the offer. Bruce began a successful solo career with the release of Songs for a Tailor in 1969. Baker later formed a jazz-fusion ensemble out of the ashes of Blind Faith, Ginger Baker’s Air Force, which featured Winwood, Blind Faith bassist Rick Grech, Graham Bond on sax, and Denny Laine of the Moody Blues, among others.

Reunions (1993, 2005)

In 1993, Cream was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and set aside their differences to perform at the induction ceremony. Initially, the trio was wary about performing, until encouraging words from Robbie Robertson inspired them to try. The end result was an incendiary set consisting of “Sunshine of Your Love,” “Crossroads,” and “Born Under a Bad Sign.” Clapton mentioned in his acceptance speech that their rehearsal the day before the ceremony marked the first time they had played together in 25 years.

Cream backstage at their Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction

The performance spurred rumours of a reunion tour. Bruce and Baker went so far as to say in later interviews that they were, indeed, interested in touring as Cream. A formal reunion did not take place immediately, however, and Clapton continued to pursue solo projects, as did Bruce and Baker, although the two did work together again in the mid-1990s as two-thirds of a power trio, BBM, with Gary Moore.

In 2004, it was officially announced that Cream would finally reunite for a series of four shows, May 2, 3, 5, and 6 of 2005 in England at the Royal Albert Hall in London, the venue of their final concerts in 1968. Even more surprising was that the reunion came at Clapton’s request: although the three musicians chose not to speak publicly about the shows, Clapton would later state that he had become more “generous” in regards to his past, and that the physical health of Bruce and Baker was a major factor: Bruce had recently undergone a liver transplant for liver cancer, one that almost cost him his life, while Baker had severe arthritis.

Cream in 2005

Tickets for all four shows sold out in under an hour. Touts were soon charging outrageous prices for what became one of the hardest-to-get tickets in rock and roll history. The performances were recorded for a live CD and DVD. Among those in attendance were Paul McCartney and Ringo Starr, Steve Winwood, Roger Waters of Pink Floyd, Brian May of Queen, Jimmy Page of Led Zeppelin and also Mick Taylor and Bill Wyman of the Rolling Stones.

The Royal Albert Hall reunion proved a success on both a personal and financial level, inspiring the reformed band to bring their reunion to the United States. For reasons unknown, Cream chose to play at only one venue, Madison Square Garden in New York City from October 24 – 26, 2005. The shows were marred by some controversy in regards to tickets: the show’s promoters had made a deal with credit card company American Express to make tickets available to American Express customers only in an unprecedented week-long pre-sale. Again, scalpers charged high prices for tickets; nevertheless, the shows were a financial success and received critical praise.

Fans of Cream hoped for a full-scale tour, but a statement from Cream’s publicist days after the last performance put the nail in that particular coffin, when it was announced that Cream would not tour the United States. In an interview with Jack Bruce in the December 2005 issue of Bass Player magazine, Bruce hinted that he would like to see Cream continue in one way or another, possibly in the form of a new album, but that a tour was out of the question: “It would be quite a challenge to try to create music that would stand up to the classic songs. I’ve got a few ideas already — in fact, I wrote a song yesterday that I think would work. I just don’t know if it will happen, because we all feel the band is so special we don’t want to do it that often, if we go on. We’ve had offers you wouldn’t believe — I didn’t believe — for long world tours, and it’s tempting. But none of us wants to accept because it would take away from the rarity and special nature of getting together. I’d like to do it every now and again and just play somewhere, but we could do an album amidst that, and I’m going to suggest it.”

The Future (2006-present)

Cream’s future is uncertain: in February of 2006, Cream received a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in recognition of their contribution to, and influence upon, modern music. That same month, a “Classic Albums” DVD was released detailing the story behind the creation and recording of Disraeli Gears. On the day prior to the Grammy ceremony, Bruce made a public statement that more one-off performances of Cream had been planned: multiple dates in a few cities, similar to the Royal Albert Hall and Madison Square Garden shows. He would not state when or where those shows would occur, claiming that he “would get chopped” if he said anything.

However, this story was rebuffed by both Clapton and Baker, first by Clapton in a Times article from April of 2006, when asked about Cream: “‘No. Not for me. We did it and it was fun. But life is too short I’ve got lots of other things I would rather do, including staying at home with my kids.’ The thing about that band, he says, was that it was all to do with its limits. ‘Here were three people who were essentially in disagreement with each other. You latched on to those rare moments of cohesion and made the most of them. But they were rare. It was an experiment.’”

In an interview regarding the release of a DVD of Blind Faith’s 1969 performance in Hyde Park, Baker made comments to the United Kingdom-based magazine Music Mart about his unwillingness to continue the Cream reunion. These comments were far more specific and explosive than Clapton’s; his reasons stemmed from Jack Bruce’s behavior at the Madison Square Garden performances: “When he’s Dr. Jekyll, he’s fine… It’s when he’s Mr. Hyde that he’s not. And I’m afraid he’s still the same. I tell you this – there won’t ever be any more Cream gigs, because he did Mr. Hyde in New York last year.”

When asked to elaborate, Baker replied: “Oh, he shouted at me on stage, he turned his bass up so loud that he deafened me on the first gig. What he does is that he apologises and apologises, but I’m afraid, to do it on a Cream reunion gig, that was the end. He killed the magic, and New York was like 1968… It was just a get through the gig, get the money sort of deal. I was absolutely amazed. I mean, he demonstrated why he got the sack from Graham Bond and why Cream didn’t last very long on stage in New York. I didn’t want to do it in the first place simply because of how Jack was. I have worked with him several times since Cream, and I promised myself that I would never work with him again. When Eric first came up with the idea, I said no, and then he phoned me up and eventually convinced me to do it. I was on my best behaviour and I did everything I could to make things go as smooth as possible, and I was really pleasant to Jack.”

Clapton would later expand on his reasons for ending the reunion: Ginger’s response to Jack’s attitude on the first night of the New York shows. Believing that the two would never see eye-to-eye almost forty years after the break-up of Cream, he chose to return to the path of solo artist. Surprisingly, despite the negative comments from Baker regarding Madison Square Garden, Jack Bruce told Detroit’s WCSX radio station in May of 2007 that there are plans for a Cream reunion later in the year: “There is some talk about us getting together later this year, which I can’t really say too much about. But it’s not a commercial thing … but we may get together for something.”

Discography

Albums

• Fresh Cream – December 1966 (RIAA:) Gold
• Disraeli Gears – November 1967 (RIAA:) Platinum
• Wheels of Fire – July 1968 (double album – In the Studio and Live at the Fillmore.) (RIAA:) Gold
• Goodbye – March 1969
• Live Cream – April 1970
• Live Cream Volume II – March 1972
• Royal Albert Hall London May 2-3-5-6 2005 – October 2005

Singles

• “Wrapping Paper” / “Cat’s Squirrel” – October 1966
• “I Feel Free” / “N.S.U.” – December 1966
• “Strange Brew” / “Tales of Brave Ulysses” – June 1967
• “Anyone for Tennis” / “Pressed Rat and Warthog” – May 1968
• “Sunshine of Your Love” / “SWLABR” – September 1968
• “Spoonful part 1″ / “Spoonful part 2″ – September 1968
• “White Room” / “Those Were The Days” – January 1969
• “Crossroads” / “Passing the Time” – January 1969
• “Badge” / “What a Bringdown” – April 1969
• “Sweet Wine” / “Lawdy Mama” – June 1970

Compilations

• Best of Cream – 1969 (RIAA:) Gold
• Heavy Cream – 1972
• Strange Brew: The Very Best of Cream – 1983 (RIAA:) Platinum
• Creme de la Cream – 1992
• The Very Best of Cream – 1995 (RIAA:) Gold
• Those Were The Days – 1997
• 20th Century Masters: The Millennium Collection: The Best of Cream – 2000
• BBC Sessions – 2003
• I Feel Free – Ultimate Cream – 2005
• Cream Gold – 2005

Videos / DVDs

• Farewell Concert – VHS, DVD, recorded Royal Albert Hall, November 1968
• Strange Brew – largely a re-edit of Farewell Concert plus some outtakes
• Fresh Live Cream – VHS, DVD, documentary filmed just after the Rock & Roll Hall Of Fame reunion in 1993 containing band interviews and previously unreleased material
• Royal Albert Hall London May 2-3-5-6 2005 – DVD, recorded Royal Albert Hall, May 2005
• Cream: Disraeli Gears (2006) – DVD, a reflection on what went into making Disraeli Gears, and the impact it had on the 60s.
• Cream: Classic Artists – DVD + CD, recorded before and after the Madison Square Garden reunion concerts; features interviews with band members, along with an audio CD containing five previously unreleased tracks from Swedish radio.

Cream – Sunshine of Your Love (2005 reunion)