No. 203: Wheels Of Fire

Band: Cream
Album: Wheels Of Fire
Why Rolling Stone gets it right: Many of Cream's definitive songs appear on "Wheels Of Fire's" first disc, specifically the perfect cream song in "White Room." Similarly, their cover of Albert King's "Born Under A Bad Sign" is the picture of great blues rock and it even has a Ringo-esque Ginger Baker-sung "Pressed Rat and Warthog." "Politician" is almost political, but still rocks. The second disc has the band live in San Francisco, tearing through "Spoonful," "Traintime," "Toad" and the blistering "Crossroads."
Why Rolling Stone gets it wrong: I'm comfortable with this record being at number 203. It's not Cream's best work, but it's certainly a fine record.
Best song: Either "White Room" or "Politician" are the highlights of the first disc. "Crossroads" is the best on the second disc and one of Cream's three best songs.
Worst song: "Traintime" on the second disc goes on too long.
Is it awesome?: Yes.

Remember when I disrespected Eric Clapton? Forget it all and listen to the "Crossroads" solo.

No. 112: Disraeli Gears

Band: Cream
Album: Disraeli Gears
Why Rolling Stone gets it right: "Disraeli Gears" has the best example of Eric Clapton's signature guitar sound in the classic "Sunshine of Your Love," and several of Cream's best songs. Also, "Tales Of Brave Ulysses," which is based on a book my high school required all students to read.
Why Rolling Stone gets it wrong: Cream is nice and all, but the hits are really the only good songs on the record. The rest is mostly acid-induced filler (as opposed to acid-induced hits).
Best song: Well, I like "Tales Of Brave Ulysses" is fantastic, though "Sunshine Of Your Love" is great.
Worst song: "Dance The Night Away" is b-a-d.
Is it awesome?: Not really.

Looking thought Eric Clapton's various recordings, one of the turning points is "Sunshine of Your Love." His guitar tone -- the "Woman Tone" -- was basically only present on the Cream records, but it's wonderful. The tube amp distortion and low brightness on his guitar sound was allegedly gained by turning the volume knob on Clapton's Gibson SG (his preferred guitar during those years) , while playing on the neck pickup almost exclusively. It's perfected on "Sunshine Of Your Love," but it appears on other songs. It's wonderfully warm, yet sharp. The slight distortion is great.

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One of the best songs on the record, in my eyes, is "Tales Of Brave Ulysses." I love nearly any rock and roll song that references a classic book and Homer's epic poem is the source for this one. Ulysses (the Latin name of Odysseus, basically)is the star of the song, as the sirens and winter affect him. It's not quite Mastodon's "Leviathan" album (a favorite of mine), but it's always cool to see musicians that have read something other than comic books and Melody Maker.

"Tales Of Brave Ulysses" is one of the first great songs that made use of the wah-wah pedal, an innovation that Clapton and Hendrix came upon around the same time. Clapton's use is less frantic than Hendrix' was, as much of "Disraeli Gears" uses the wah-wah as a tone pedal, left at one position. "Tales Of Brave Ulysses" has a lot of wah-wah work and it's some of Clapton's best.

"Strange Brew" and "SWLABR" are both cool songs, though both are clearly all about drugs (SWLABR stands for "She Walks Like A Bearded Rainbow," whatever that means). Clapton's love of old American blues is also well-executed on "Outside Woman Blues," wherein he says he's going to get a bulldog, which always makes me happy.

But, otherwise, there are songs like "Take It Back." The song's lyrics are essentially "Take it back, take it back, take that thing right out of here." Not "thang." Thing. The creative juices clearly weren't flowing on that particular day for Jack Bruce.

Cream is a greatest hits band and I'm OK with that. It's not just a Clapton side project (check back later this week for one of those), but it's also not a great band.

No. 101: Fresh Cream

(Despite my general ambivalence about this record, that album cover is excellent, don't you think?)
Band: Cream
Album: Fresh Cream
Why Rolling Stone gets it right: The debut album from what became known as the world's foremost supergroup, "Fresh Cream" took blues-based rock to a new audience. Eric Clapton's guitar brilliance, while still in its relative infancy, works brilliant solos while Jack Bruce and Ginger Baker rhytymn away. Underrated is Jack Bruce's vocals; The man could sing.
Why Rolling Stone gets it wrong: The songs just aren't great. The parts are good, the sum of the parts aren't great.
Best song: The album opener, "I Feel Free," is great. Some of the blues classics -- "Spoonful" comes to mind -- are also great.
Worst song: "Dreaming" is pretty mediocre.
Is it awesome?: Meh. Cream hit their peak later, though, there are some gems here.

It's easy to forget, in modern rock and roll, that so many bands of the '60s wrote only half-ish of their songs on any given album. The pre-"Revolver" Beatles, for example, included at least two covers on each album.

The first record from Cream -- the band for which the term "supergroup" was partially invented -- has four blues standards on it. Two of those songs are among the albums best.

That's not to say that Cream:"Spoonful" as The Beatles:"Roll Over Beethoven." In fact, The Beatles were much more straight ahead in their covers. Cream's power trio sound added a lot to Wilie Dixon's classic, making it an even more desperate/powerful love song. It's one of those songs that's been played by everyone (Howlin' Wolf, Etta James, etc.), but arguably, Cream's is the best.

"Fresh Cream" is Eric Clapton's first appearance on the list and it's mostly fitting. It was on "Fresh Cream" that you saw Clapton's soloing style fall into place: He started basically slowing stuff down and working more melodic soloing into his repertoire. While the Blues Breakers were where Clapton was God (as the famous graffiti read), "Fresh Cream" was where he became Eric Clapton.

It's not their best work. "Disraeli Gears" has more interesting songs and "Goodbye" is their tightest. But, "Fresh Cream" has some great tracks that portend some excellent music.