Formation (1966) By July 1966,
Eric Clapton's career with
the Yardbirds and
John Mayall & the Bluesbreakers had earned him a reputation as one of the premier
blues guitarists in Britain. Clapton, however, found the environment of Mayall's band confining, and sought to expand his playing in a new band. In 1966, Clapton met
Ginger Baker, then the drummer of
the Graham Bond Organisation, for which
Jack Bruce had played bass guitar, harmonica and piano. Baker felt stifled in the Graham Bond Organisation and had grown tired of
Graham Bond's drug addictions and bouts of mental instability. "I had always liked Ginger", explained Clapton. "Ginger had come to see me play with the Bluesbreakers. 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 agreed, on the condition that Baker hire Bruce, who had joined
Manfred Mann since leaving Graham Bond, as the group's bassist; Clapton had met Bruce when the bassist/vocalist briefly played with the Bluesbreakers in November 1965; the two also had recorded together as part of an
ad hoc group dubbed
Powerhouse (which also included
Steve Winwood and
Paul Jones). Impressed with Bruce's vocals and technical prowess, Clapton wanted to work with him on an ongoing basis. In contrast, while Bruce was in Bond's band, he and Baker had been notorious for their quarrelling. Their volatile relationship included on-stage fights and the sabotage of one another's instruments. Baker and Bruce tried 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" among 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". he occasionally harmonised with Bruce, and in time, took lead vocals on several Cream tracks including "
Four Until Late", "
Strange Brew", "World of Pain", "
Outside Woman Blues", "Crossroads", and "
Badge".
Fresh Cream (1966) The band's debut album,
Fresh Cream, was recorded and released in 1966. The album reached number 6 in the UK charts and number 39 in the US. It was evenly split between self-penned originals and blues covers, including "Four Until Late", "
Rollin' and Tumblin'", "Spoonful", "
I'm So Glad" and "Cat's Squirrel". The rest of the songs were written by either Jack Bruce or Ginger Baker. ("I Feel Free", a UK hit single, This, the band's second album, was released in November 1967 and reached the top five in the charts on both sides of the Atlantic. Produced by
Felix Pappalardi (who later co-founded the Cream-influenced hard rock band
Mountain) and engineer
Tom Dowd, 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.
Disraeli Gears also included "
Sunshine of Your Love", which became the group's highest-charting song, peaking at number five on the U.S.
Billboard Hot 100. The album was originally slated for release in the summer of 1967, but the record label opted to scrap the planned cover and repackage it with a new psychedelic cover, designed by artist
Martin Sharp, and the resulting changes delayed its release for several months. The cover was remarkable for the time, with a
psychedelic design patterned over a publicity photo of the trio. In August 1967, the band played their first headlining dates in the US, first at
The Fillmore in San Francisco and later at
The Pinnacle in Los Angeles. The concerts were a great success and proved very influential on both the band itself and the flourishing
hippie scene surrounding them. Upon discovering a growing listening audience, the band began to stretch out on stage, incorporating more time in their repertoire, some songs reaching jams of twenty minutes. Long, drawn-out jams in numbers like "Spoonful", "N.S.U.", "I'm So Glad", and "Sweet Wine" became live favourites, while songs like "Sunshine of Your Love", "Crossroads", and "Tales of Brave Ulysses" remained reasonably short.
Wheels of Fire (1968) In 1968 came the band's third release,
Wheels of Fire, which topped the American charts. The album was recorded in a spate of short sessions from July 1967 to June 1968. Still a relative novelty, the double album of two LP records was well-suited to extended solos. The
Wheels of Fire studio recordings showcased the band moving away from the blues and more towards a semi-
progressive rock style highlighted by odd
time signatures and various orchestral instruments. However, the band did record
Howlin' Wolf's "
Sitting on Top of the World" and
Albert King's "Born Under a Bad Sign". According to a
BBC interview with Clapton, the record company,
Atco Records, also handling Albert King, asked the band to cover "Born Under a Bad Sign", which became a popular track off the record. The opening song, "
White Room", became a radio staple. Another song, "Politician", was written by the band while waiting to perform live at the BBC. After the completion of
Wheels of Fire in mid-1968, the band members had grown tired of their exhausting touring schedule and increasingly loud jamming, and wanted to go their separate ways. Baker stated 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 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 stupidity." 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 become interested in the music of
Bob Dylan's former backing group, now known as
the Band, and their debut album,
Music from Big Pink, Cream decided that they would break up in May 1968 during a tour of the US. Cream were eventually persuaded to do one final album, appropriately titled
Goodbye. The album was recorded in late 1968 and released in early 1969, after the band had broken up. It comprised six songs: three live recordings dating from a concert at
The Forum in Los Angeles, California, on 19 October, and three new studio recordings (including "Badge", which was written by Clapton and
George Harrison, who also played rhythm guitar and was credited as "L'Angelo Misterioso"). "I'm So Glad" was included among the live tracks. Cream's farewell tour consisted of 22 shows at 19 venues in the US from 4 October to 4 November 1968, and two final farewell concerts at the
Royal Albert Hall on 25 and 26 November 1968. The final US gig was at the
Rhode Island Auditorium on 4 November. The band arrived late, and due to local restrictions, were able to perform only two songs, "Toad" and a 20+ minute version of "Spoonful". 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." Bruce had three Marshall stacks on stage for the farewell shows but one acted only as a spare, and he only used one or two, depending on the song. In an interview from
Cream: Classic Artists, he added that the band was getting worse by the minute.
Post-Cream Blind Faith, a band that included both Clapton and Baker, was formed after the demise of Cream, following an attempt by Clapton to recruit
Steve Winwood into Cream in the hope that he would help act as a buffer between Bruce and Baker. Initially, the trio were wary about performing, until encouraging words from
Robbie Robertson inspired them to try. The set consisted of "Sunshine of Your Love", "Crossroads", and "Born Under a Bad Sign", a song they had previously played live just three times. Clapton mentioned in his acceptance speech that their rehearsal the day before the ceremony had marked the first time they had played together in 25 years. Although the three musicians chose not to speak publicly about the shows, Clapton would later state that he had become more "generous" in regard to his past, and that the physical health of Bruce and Baker was a major factor:
Paul McCartney,
Ringo Starr,
Roger Waters,
Brian May,
Jimmy Page, and
Mick Taylor. The reunion marked the first time the band had played "Badge" and "Pressed Rat and Warthog" live. According to Clapton, these concerts did not live up to the Royal Albert Hall performances due to, among other reasons, lack of rehearsal and the resurgence of old grudges among band members.
Post-2005 In February 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. However, this story was denied by both Clapton and Baker, first by Clapton in
The Times in April 2006. When asked about Cream, Clapton said: "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 was that it was all to do with its limits ... it was an experiment." In an interview in the UK magazine
Music Mart, about the release of a DVD about the
Blind Faith concert in
Hyde Park 1969, Baker commented about his unwillingness to continue the Cream reunion. These comments were far more specific and explosive than Clapton's, as they were centred around his relationship with Jack Bruce. Ginger said, "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." In an interview with BBC 6 Music in April 2010, Bruce confirmed that there would be no more Cream shows, stating simply, "Cream is over." Bruce died on 25 October 2014 and Baker died on 6 October 2019, leaving Clapton as the last surviving member. ==Style and legacy==