Bluesbreakers with Eric Clapton - Hideaway

Eric Clapton was probably the first major star of the Blues Rock genre, with a love of blues that went back to his youth.  He developed an encyclopedic knowledge not just of the records, but the musicians and geography of the blues as well.  Although he later moved onto other forms of music, in his early days Clapton was a blues purist, and shunned other forms of music.  When he got his first break with the Yardbirds, he resented the pop songs they recorded once they landed a contract.  After finishing their breakthrough single “For Your Love”, Clapton decided that was enough, and didn’t want to be a part of the new direction his band was taking.  So he left the Yardbirds as they were on the brink of international stardom.  A short time later, he would find another opportunity, and this time he felt he had a home where he could pursue the blues music he loved.

  He only stayed with John Mayall’s Bluesbreakers for about a year and recorded only one album before leaving to form Cream with Jack Bruce and Peter “Ginger” Baker.  However, during his stint in Mayall’s band, his playing inspired such zeal among his fans that the words “Clapton is God” were spray painted all over London.  At the time, the average person who saw the graffiti probably had no idea who it was referring to, but his playing had so mesmerized his audience that they had to get their message out.  After that year with Mayall, he decided to move on and form Cream. That didn’t last long, either, but it was long enough to establish Clapton’s reputation and pave the way for the mega stardom he achieved in the 1970s.

  I decided to post a link to the Bluesbreaker’s cover of Freddy King’s “Hideaway”.  This album, as far as I know, was the first in which Clapton used a Gibson Les Paul played through a Marshall amp, which became the signature tone of the British Blues Rock movement.  Although British blues guitarists played several different guitars, the Les Paul became the model of choice, with Jeff Beck, Jimmy Page, and Peter Green all using it as their main instrument.  Eventually, Clapton switched to the Fender Stratocaster, but the heavy Gibson sound is what the standard became after the Bluesbreakers album.  This was also probably the closest thing to a pure blues album that Clapton put out until 1994’s From the Cradle.

http://youtu.be/UvI0P6o_H8k