Eric Clapton joined the Yardbirds in 1963, left for John Mayall’s Bluesbreakers in 1965, and within a year had co-founded Cream — reconfiguring the role of the electric guitar across just three years. The speed of that trajectory helps explain the now-legendary piece of North London graffiti declaring “CLAPTON IS GOD.” Asked about it in a 1994 interview with Guitarist, Clapton was unapologetic: “I thought it was quite justified to be honest with you. I suppose I felt I deserved it for the amount of seriousness that I’d put into it.”
That seriousness had a clear origin point. Clapton had grown up on early rock ‘n’ roll, as most of his peers had, but it was hearing Freddie King for the first time that redirected everything. In his 2007 autobiography, Clapton described the experience in stark terms: “Listening to him had an effect on me similar to what I might feel if I were to meet an alien from outer space. It simply blew my mind.” The record was the 7″ single for Hideaway, and its B-side, I Love The Woman, contained what Clapton called an “earth-shattering” guitar solo — one that demonstrated, in his words, how “expressive and melodic” the blues could be, bending strings to produce sounds that “gave me the shivers.”
Other influences shaped his developing ear. George Barnes’ playing on Connie Francis’ Lipstick On Your Collar registered early on, as did James Burton’s country-inflected style. Fellow Roosters guitarist Tom McGuinness is credited with introducing Clapton to Freddie King in the first place. From there, Clapton pursued what he described as a self-directed education — tracing blues back through Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee, Big Bill Broonzy, Chuck Berry, and Bo Diddley, mapping the geography, chronology, and regional variations of the music. “The only education I ever really had was finding out about blues,” he told Guitarist.
That education ran alongside a growing contempt for what was dominating popular culture at the time. Clapton viewed the mass adulation directed at the Beatles as, in his word, “despicable” — frustrated that his blues heroes had gone largely unrecognised while Beatlemania swept the country. The irritation, by his own account, pushed him back into rehearsal rooms and deeper into the music.
The Yardbirds gave him a proper outlet from autumn 1963. The band played Willie Dixon, Billy Boy Arnold, and Sonny Boy Williamson material, with Clapton taking lead vocals on Williamson’s Good Morning, School Girl. It was during this period that he acquired the nickname Slowhand — earned by calmly restringing his guitar mid-set while audiences slow-clapped their impatience. When the Yardbirds began achieving mainstream success with the Graham Gouldman-penned For Your Love, which reached the Top Ten, Clapton’s response was to leave. Commercial appeal, it seemed, was never part of the mission.
Source: Latest from MusicRadar
