0:09

Cream is the money, dollar

0:12

dollar bills y'all.

0:15

I can't believe we're doing Wu-Tang Clan sucks huh?

0:18

Yeah I'm trying to die tonight. It's funny when

0:20

you search bands like Cream on Google

0:22

you have to put Cream band. Cause

0:25

if you just search Cream sucks it's like

0:27

Wu-Tang Clan or people

0:29

that are lactose intolerant are like yeah

0:32

fuck Cream. How shitty

0:34

is Cream? And it's like oh they're actually talking

0:36

about Cream. It's

0:39

legitimately a bad band name just for that

0:41

reason. Well they only existed for three years so fuck

0:43

this. This episode should be as long, 10

0:46

minutes for every year this band even

0:48

existed. 10 minutes so this

0:50

is going to be what a 30, 25 minute episode.

0:53

It's also even worse when you realize

0:56

why they chose the name Cream. It's because

0:58

they're assholes. Yeah

1:01

it's exactly that. It's because they were

1:03

all in bands that had previously gotten

1:05

attention on the

1:07

rock scene in England and

1:09

a lot

1:10

of people think of this as the first super

1:12

group which is fucking hilarious because

1:14

if Eric Clapton didn't go on to have

1:16

the solo career that he had nobody

1:18

would give a shit about the bands they were originally in.

1:21

But people did at the time so when these guys

1:23

came together to form Cream

1:25

they themselves were

1:27

referring to themselves as the Cream

1:29

of the crop. We're the best. This

1:32

band name basically means we are the best.

1:35

There's a... I will

1:37

say this all the way up until this

1:40

very moment in time at

1:42

least Eric Clapton

1:44

has legitimately

1:47

kept the

1:49

Venn diagram of Cream

1:51

backslash Eric Clapton fans

1:54

and pure assholes a perfect

1:56

circle. There's no chance

1:59

that you'd... loved Cream slash

2:02

Eric Clapton and you're not a complete

2:04

piece of shit. No chance

2:06

you're not. You're a dickhead. The reason

2:09

why we have to do an episode on Cream is

2:11

A, there is enough material

2:14

and B, fucking obviously

2:16

at some point we're going to do an entirely separate

2:19

episode on Eric Clapton. Holy

2:22

shit. That guy's songs. What

2:24

the fuck. I know. That's

2:26

the thing is, I wonder. Okay,

2:29

people forget. So Clapton explodes

2:32

again in the 90s with Tears From Heaven, whatever.

2:35

And so many people in that moment go

2:37

back and listen to Cream

2:39

or things that Clapton did before. I

2:41

just want, I mean, Cream has some obviously massive

2:44

songs that probably everyone knows the words to

2:46

or has heard at some point in their life, unfortunately.

2:49

But like three. Like three of them. Yeah,

2:51

they have three hits that everyone knows. But

2:54

maybe two. But

2:57

I just wonder how many bands

2:59

or how many people, this is for sure a band that

3:02

would have just faded into obscurity minus

3:04

the two songs or three songs that everyone knows. Nobody

3:07

ever talked to them again. But we have to talk about them again

3:09

because at some point in time Eric Clapton went on.

3:11

It's definitely his fault. Agree. Like

3:14

even though this was regarded as a supergroup at the time. It's his fault

3:16

that we're still having to talk about this shit. Exactly.

3:19

What I said about the first bands these guys were in

3:21

also would apply to Cream if

3:24

Eric Clapton didn't go on and do

3:26

that. Yes. But this is an episode on

3:28

Cream. When we talk about why

3:31

white British dudes should have left

3:33

the blues completely alone, there

3:36

are a lot of very good reasons. One

3:38

of them is that these

3:41

dudes clearly demonstrate a

3:44

total lack of understanding of what

3:46

the genre even is. And

3:48

if you don't believe that, if you think

3:50

that these British

3:53

white guys actually clocked

3:55

the blues, legitimately internalized

3:58

it, were able to act like they were going to the actually

4:00

perform the thing for what

4:02

the thing is, I would

4:04

love for you to go listen to the Cream song,

4:07

Sleepy Time Time, from

4:09

their first album. The music on the

4:11

song is a fairly

4:13

incompetent and extremely hacky

4:16

version of A Straightforward Blues

4:18

with Clapton fucking up over half

4:21

of the bends in his lead by

4:23

close to a quarter step as he does throughout

4:25

this and every Cream album. Here

4:28

are some lyrics from the song. I'm a sleepy

4:30

time baby, a sleepy

4:33

time boy, work only

4:35

maybe, life is a joy.

4:38

Then the chorus is him saying

4:41

the words, we'll have a sleepy

4:43

time time over and over, sleepy

4:46

time all the time. I

4:49

would truly love to know if BB

4:51

King ever heard this song, please

4:53

if anyone happens to be aware of

4:56

BB King having heard this song, I would love

4:58

to know how much he had to have motherfucking

5:00

hated this shit. It's like

5:02

a children's cartoon show making fun

5:04

of the blues. There's gotta

5:07

be so many moments in

5:09

history specifically with Cream just

5:11

as an example where all

5:14

these really amazing blues

5:16

artists that are just writing these amazing blues songs

5:19

and they listen to Cream and they're like, what the

5:21

fuck? And it's just exploding

5:24

and everyone loves it. And they're literally going,

5:26

I will fight these fucking guys if I ever

5:28

see them. I cannot believe that people

5:31

like this because you could literally

5:33

listen to almost anything

5:35

else from this time period and go,

5:38

that is a better version of this. Listen

5:41

to the BB King song chains and things. Listen

5:43

to the Otis Rush song, my love

5:45

will never die. We

5:47

are talking about the difference between

5:50

Olympian athletes and

5:53

a

5:55

six year old children's soccer team. Yeah.

5:58

It's embarrassing, man.

5:59

And the fact that so many f***ing

6:02

dudes who have a soul

6:04

patch and wear a stupid f***ing pork pie

6:06

hat and refer to themselves

6:08

as having soul make

6:11

this their whole identity, not

6:13

blues. Eric Clapton and Cream

6:16

and all these British bands, their

6:18

version of the blues. What is

6:20

happening? It is genuinely

6:23

the most embarrassing thing. It's

6:25

more embarrassing than rockabilly and that is

6:27

f***ing embarrassing. Jesus,

6:29

that's deep cut bro. That's deep.

6:32

That's

6:32

tough. But I agree. You took

6:34

what was great and you were like, let's

6:37

make it mediocre f***ing

6:39

bullshit. This is so good.

6:41

Okay, blues is cool, but what if it

6:44

was made by racists? Yeah. If

6:46

Cream is your favorite band, I

6:48

legitimately think you have the worst

6:51

taste in music on earth. I

6:53

don't think there are very many people who would say that. You

6:55

suck if Cream is in your top

6:58

five favorite bands. F***

7:00

you. You have terrible taste in

7:02

music. What is wrong with you? First

7:04

of all, they existed for f***ing no time

7:07

at all. No one gave a s***. They wrote

7:09

two songs, three songs that anyone even cares

7:11

about. And they shouldn't have. They should

7:14

have written those songs and given them to anybody

7:16

else to play. That would have been their greatest

7:18

contribution to music if Cream didn't exist.

7:21

But they wrote these songs and let somebody

7:23

else with actually an ounce of soul

7:26

in their body. They're not good songs. That would be

7:28

terrible. Robin Trower once quoted

7:30

Eric Clapton as saying that he went into

7:32

Cream a Blues player and came out a rock guitarist,

7:34

to which Robin Trower replied, quote,

7:37

if it's that easy to lose your ability

7:39

to play the blues, you never really had

7:42

it. End quote. Exactly. People

7:44

put it on a pedestal. This is hard. It's

7:46

not easy. You can't fake it. It's either

7:48

there or it's not. Of course,

7:51

it's easy to go from being a blues guitar player

7:53

to a rock guitar player because it's backwards.

7:56

You're supposed to go the other way. You're supposed to go

7:58

from a rock guitar player to a blues guitar player.

7:59

You're supposed to get better, not worse. It's

8:02

the

8:03

fucking truest thing

8:05

you have ever said on this show.

8:07

The only band that these guys were in before

8:09

Cream that anyone still cares about is the Yardbirds.

8:13

The one that Eric Clapton was in. If Eric

8:15

Clapton was the only guitar player who was ever

8:17

in the Yardbirds, no one would care about the Yardbirds

8:19

either. Easily the worst lead guitar

8:21

player, whoever in that band. The other

8:23

two are Jeff Beck, who

8:26

I'm pretty sure is an alien

8:28

because of what he can do with a guitar and

8:30

Jimmy Page, who yeah is sloppy live,

8:33

but give him a recording studio and he's gonna blow

8:35

your dick off. It's

8:37

insane to me that there's anyone who would rather

8:40

listen to Eric Clapton play guitar

8:42

than Jimmy Page or Jeff

8:44

Beck. Why? How?

8:47

How and why? What do you like?

8:50

He can't bend to pitch. I mean, that's

8:52

a pretty big part of playing lead. He's

8:55

rigid, shitty guitar

8:57

player. He's soulless. There's no feeling there.

8:59

You can't fake feeling. That's

9:02

just the fucking truth. You

9:04

can play the riffs of songs.

9:07

The feeling behind it, you can't fake.

9:10

It is a real thing. Listen to

9:12

how awful his lead playing is on the song

9:14

Sweet Wine. We're talking Jimmy Page

9:16

live levels of sloppiness, except

9:18

this isn't a recording studio. Therefore

9:21

I think it's extremely safe to assume what we're

9:23

hearing is the best take Clapton could get

9:26

after trying and failing to get a clean take

9:28

the way that Jimmy Page would have done in the studio.

9:31

It's very important to note how awful this band

9:33

was from the very beginning because, and

9:35

if anyone replying to this episode tells me you

9:38

love the whole first Cream album, I

9:40

absolutely do not believe you. I

9:42

think you're lying. The

9:44

reason it's important to recognize this band sucked

9:47

from the start. This is

9:49

an early example of a rock

9:51

band that the fans talk about as

9:54

if they were amazing at the start

9:56

and then went to shit. This

9:58

is a standard thing that people. always say about

10:00

Cream is like, yeah, they weren't

10:02

good by the end of it, but they used to be amazing. Listen

10:05

to the train wreck version

10:08

of Rollin' and Tumbling on Fresh Cream

10:11

where they didn't even bother to look up the goddamn

10:13

lyrics of the song. And

10:16

then listen to Rosalie Hills. Rosalie,

10:19

R-O-S-A-L-I-E, Hill

10:21

like Blueberry Hill. Her definitive

10:24

version of the song from years earlier,

10:26

that is the difference between good music and bad

10:28

music and it is plain as day. If

10:31

you can't hear that, pack it

10:33

in. Just forget about trying

10:35

to talk to people about the music that you like because

10:37

you're not good at listening to music and you're

10:40

definitely not going to be good at talking about it. Just

10:42

give them a musical together. Speaking

10:45

of people being too stupid to even know what they're

10:47

hearing, I would love to know how many

10:50

folks approaching this era

10:52

of music from way after the fact, you know,

10:54

like people now, their dad listens to

10:56

Layla all the time. So they go

10:58

back and check out the Layla guys first

11:01

band. I would love to know how many of those people think

11:03

that they're listening to Eric Clapton sing every

11:05

one of these songs. Sure. I would say a

11:07

vast majority of people don't even realize who

11:10

they're listening to for sure. Now it

11:12

is. Now looking back,

11:14

no doubt. It's mind blowing that people consider Clapton

11:17

to be a god-tier guitarist when

11:19

one of the main reasons that Cream broke

11:21

up is even Eric Clapton

11:24

hated listening to Eric Clapton play

11:26

guitar. That is a fact. That's awesome.

11:29

That is as much of a fact as a fact

11:31

can be a fact. Cream didn't have a lot

11:33

of songs rehearsed when they started. So when they

11:35

played shows, they had to turn the few

11:37

songs they did know how to play together into

11:40

long jam sessions. And that

11:42

is what people came to expect when they went to a

11:44

Cream concert. And as you

11:46

can see, the fans touring with this band year round, playing night

11:48

after night, slowly comes to the realization

11:51

that the shit he's playing in these jam sessions

11:54

all sounds the same. He doesn't seem

11:56

to be getting any better at the instrument or progressing

11:59

in really anyway and he

12:01

gets this whole complex about it. You can look

12:03

this up if you think I'm lying. He wasn't

12:05

just sick of his own playing. He was sick of the music

12:08

the entire band was playing. There

12:10

is a 1974 interview he did

12:12

with Rolling Stone magazine where he talks

12:14

about how he felt like a con man

12:17

for basically the entire last

12:19

year that he was in cream because he had

12:21

become certain the music they were playing was

12:23

bad, but the audience kept loving

12:26

it. He knew for a fact

12:28

he was in a band. People were going to

12:31

convince themselves they loved no matter

12:33

how badly the band played and

12:35

he hated himself for it. I

12:38

just love the idea of him

12:41

saying that somebody like. He said that

12:43

to a fucking reporter. Do you have

12:46

any idea how strongly you have to feel something

12:48

like that to undermine the

12:50

bands that you were just in completely? And

12:53

it's not like he's one of the dudes who hates the other guys

12:55

in this band. It's the other two guys in the band that hate

12:57

each other. Clapton's fine with everyone.

13:00

He doesn't have a reason to say this shit unless

13:02

it's true. Yeah, I mean, goddamn,

13:05

the fact that like this interview

13:07

happens in time and anybody

13:10

continues to listen to cream after the

13:12

fact really shows you how fucking terrible

13:14

people are at deciphering music.

13:17

Or respecting yourself. Have

13:19

some fucking self respect. If the

13:21

guy in the band is saying that he's

13:23

not proud of it and that it sucks, maybe

13:26

you should also stop listening

13:28

to it. Yo, do

13:30

me a favor real quick if you're listening to this

13:32

podcast. Which you are. You're obviously

13:34

listening to this podcast. You think they're listening to

13:36

the podcast right now? They're still listening. Yeah,

13:39

I guess they're listening, yeah. We really

13:41

need you to subscribe wherever you're listening.

13:44

Hit the subscribe button. Definitely make sure

13:46

you're subscribed. We've got merch now.

13:48

What, shirts and pins and stickers and stuff?

13:51

Yeah, on the website. Go to our website, YFBSPod.com.

13:54

Just do it. That would be a good slogan for something. We should make

13:57

a shirt. Okay. If

14:00

one of the members of the band says, okay,

14:02

this band sucks, well, why

14:04

are we even here talking about it? You all

14:07

should have stopped listening to this shit.

14:09

In Eric Clapton's own opinion, Cream

14:11

is music for people who cannot tell the

14:14

difference between good music and bad music,

14:16

cannot intelligently critique

14:18

what they're listening to and decide whether

14:21

it's good or bad. But for some reason, he continues

14:24

to go on with his career and do other

14:26

things for some reason, instead of going, this

14:28

was fun, guys, I'm not a good guitar player

14:30

and I never will be. Goodbye. He

14:32

talks about, obviously he's giving these interviews and

14:35

he says that he hated being in the band for the entire last

14:37

year. The last year, this is a band for fucking

14:39

two and a half years, dude. Get the fuck out of here.

14:41

Literally in a band for a year and a half before

14:44

that. And hate is a very strong word.

14:46

I think it's fair to assume you

14:48

could use words like, not loving

14:50

it for the first year. This was an

14:53

idea that they had and none

14:55

of them ever really fully got into it.

14:58

Their response to telling

15:00

everyone that they were gonna be in a band together, finding

15:03

out that it's not actually a good band was

15:06

fuck it, let's just make more noise.

15:08

Let's just start jamming out. We'll just play

15:10

a lot of extra stuff. We'll just give people more

15:13

and more and more and more. Also Clapton

15:15

is playing through New Marshall, New Marshall

15:18

amplifiers that hadn't existed, both of them are. Clapton

15:20

and Jack Bruce are playing through loud fucking

15:22

guitar amps that hadn't existed. People

15:25

are hearing a sound that

15:27

they've never heard before. They're

15:29

getting confused and they think that the sound is fucking

15:31

incredible. Like the first movies that

15:33

were made, the technology

15:36

blew people's fucking

15:38

minds. There's a very famous story

15:41

about one of the first things

15:43

that anyone filmed was a train

15:45

coming toward the lens and

15:48

people watching it in an early

15:50

theater, blown away, diving out of

15:52

the way because they think the train is coming at it. That

15:55

doesn't mean that's the best train sequence

15:57

ever filmed or that it

15:59

was even. Good man, it's

16:01

cream. They're not good. They're just fucking loud

16:03

and you haven't heard loud before It

16:05

sounds good to you because it's

16:08

a new experience man Yeah, the

16:10

first blowjob you got probably wasn't

16:12

very good either But it was in

16:14

your head as being the best thing ever happened you because

16:17

at the time maybe it was you came in three Seconds

16:19

good time. Yeah The

16:21

reason why I said all that is I know for a fact

16:24

one of the things that people are gonna try to use to argue

16:26

Cream's case is they released the first platinum

16:28

selling double album No, that's

16:30

not awesome because of everything that

16:32

we have talked about so far in this episode It's

16:35

a bad band They knew it was a bad band

16:37

and their response to being in a bad band was

16:39

to just give people more of it at a Louder

16:41

volume. That's why they made the fucking

16:43

double album in the first place Them

16:46

knowing that only idiots

16:48

were gonna buy it isn't an argument

16:50

for the album being good or double albums

16:52

being a good idea Cream released wheels

16:55

of fire a double album that sold a million copies

16:57

and that's why so many bands immediately

17:00

Decided that it was a great idea to make double

17:02

albums. It's not it wasn't then it's

17:04

not now It's never been a good idea to make a double

17:07

album goddamn They paved the way

17:09

for the shittiest thing that bands ever

17:12

do double fucking album

17:15

Of which 90% of not well

17:17

in cream situation 99% of songs fucking

17:19

suck Yeah, that's

17:21

a bad album your parents bought this shit because

17:23

of probably one song on the entire

17:26

album that for some reason Stuck out in their head The

17:29

thing about bands like cream and those albums

17:31

is it just paid the way for so much

17:33

shit on the band side It said

17:35

it's okay to put out a double album.

17:37

Look we told a million copies. This

17:39

is good music This is good blues.

17:42

Listen, how good these guys played

17:44

their instruments in a whole generation of

17:46

people said yeah, man They

17:49

just ruined entire Generations

17:52

of people's brains to think that this

17:54

is quality music to albums

17:56

of shit Cream

17:58

has this reputation of being one

18:00

of the best live bands of all time. And that

18:03

is so hilarious because there's so

18:05

much footage out there of this band

18:08

sucking all of the ass. After

18:10

they decided to break up, they did a farewell concert.

18:12

You can find it on YouTube. They opened

18:15

with the song White Room. And at first

18:17

you'll think, this song's stupid but

18:19

at least they are playing it mostly

18:21

like the record. Then Eric

18:24

Clapton begins playing a lead

18:26

and you realize this band should definitely

18:29

have hired a touring guitarist to

18:31

play rhythm because when the rhythm guitar

18:33

drops out, everything turns

18:36

into guitar center levels

18:38

of people who don't sound like they're even trying

18:41

to play the same song. And the curse of

18:43

the three piece rock band.

18:46

At the end of the day, everything that's been recorded

18:48

and everyone knows because they listen to the radio

18:51

at the time or they listen to your albums

18:53

on vinyl or eight track,

18:55

certainly there are not just three

18:58

people that they're listening to play these

19:00

songs. So if you play them live,

19:03

it just so happens that maybe the song is

19:05

missing a few items. And if you don't

19:07

want to admit that performance of that song is terrible,

19:09

check out the rest of the concert. Specifically the

19:12

songs Politician or I'm So Glad

19:14

or Sitting on Top of the World or Spoonful.

19:17

It'll make you wonder why anyone ever thought Cream

19:19

was a good band. Half the songs I just

19:21

mentioned are covers of older blues

19:23

songs that you can and should go

19:26

listen to the originals. You will instantly

19:28

learn why there's no reason

19:30

to listen to Cream play those songs.

19:33

There was never a reason for any of this to exist

19:36

man. It's just no. Well,

19:38

there is when you have a giant ego and you think you're

19:40

a great guitar player at the time. If people

19:42

are calling you a super group from the jump,

19:44

you eat your own shit and believe it, right? Yeah,

19:47

man, we're a fucking super group. Everyone

19:49

in this band is fucking great man. We're so fucking

19:51

talented. The band Sublime

19:54

contributed more to their covers of

19:56

all the songs that they covered than Cream

19:58

contributed to covers at the time. they did. Pretty

20:00

inarguable, honestly. Compare the discography,

20:03

compare the originals to what the

20:05

latter band did with them. Sublime

20:08

comes out a better band than Cream. Sorry. Cream was

20:11

barely paying attention to each other when they

20:13

played. Jack Bruce had a reputation of

20:15

turning his amps up as loud as they would go because

20:18

he only really cared about hearing himself.

20:21

Clapton is on record that there was

20:23

one concert where he just stopped playing to see

20:25

if either Jack Bruce or Ginger Baker would

20:27

notice and neither of them did. This

20:30

jamming. Why being a band, man?

20:32

What's the point? That's fundamentally

20:35

a bad band. One of them

20:37

can stop playing and the other two don't

20:39

know. How are

20:41

you a fan of this band? And you're still just like, yup, probably

20:44

gonna go get a Cream tattoo later today. In fairness

20:47

to Cream, they were only a band

20:49

for two years. It wouldn't even matter

20:51

if these guys were the best people to ever

20:53

play their particular instruments because they're

20:55

not playing it with the rest of the band. That's

20:58

what a band is for. Maybe this is a common

21:00

story also with quote on quote, I'm

21:02

using heavy quotes here.

21:04

Super groups,

21:06

you have people that come into a musical

21:09

agreement with each other that already have

21:11

massive egos. They already have

21:13

everyone around them saying, dude, you're the best singer, you're

21:15

the best drummer, you're the best guitar player, whatever.

21:18

So they're coming into this situation already

21:21

with these fucking mind blowing

21:24

lack of personal reflection.

21:27

They think that they're God's gift to everything.

21:29

So I mean, it kind of makes sense to me that Clapton

21:32

stops playing the music and I've been noticing

21:34

it because they're already just living in their own head.

21:36

That's all they're doing is a whole mess of three piece,

21:39

a bunch of dudes that only care about

21:41

what they're doing. They're never really

21:43

a band. It's just a group of random

21:45

fucking guys that already had success jamming

21:48

together and shitting out a couple songs. And

21:51

then they break up some success. Not very

21:53

successful. This level of ego response to

21:55

the level of success that they had is

21:57

off the chart. Wildly disproportionate, man. It

22:00

does not make sense. Not equal. I would

22:02

love to know how many times Clapton was humbled

22:04

in his life. I would assume many. It would

22:06

literally be like you had one tweet go

22:08

viral on Twitter and then went to New

22:11

York City to try to get a book deal. Like that is

22:13

the equivalent of response

22:15

to the reaction to what they had already done at this

22:17

point. For another example of how shitty

22:20

this band always was, even

22:22

in a controlled environment where they

22:24

have the opportunity to play a song

22:27

again and again until they get it right. Listen

22:29

to the song Strange Brew. This is the opening

22:32

track of Disraeli Gear. This is the first

22:34

song on the album. This band

22:36

puts out a new album. This is the first song that

22:38

fans are going to hear on the album. Right. You would

22:40

want to make a good impression in that situation.

22:43

Usually, usually about 80 seconds

22:45

into the song. They're coming out of the chorus into the

22:47

guitar solo. Ginger fucks up

22:50

the beat at the exact moment

22:52

that Jack hits a wrong note on bass.

22:55

Both of them make independent mistakes

22:57

at the same fucking time. On the first

22:59

song of the album, again, presumably

23:03

the reason why it's on the album is it's the best

23:05

take they got that day. Clapton's

23:07

playing on that song is an attempt

23:10

to rip off the guitar from Albert King

23:12

songs Crosscut Saw and Oh,

23:14

Pretty Woman, which you should listen

23:16

to because both of those records tower

23:18

over anything Cream ever even thought

23:21

about doing. Honestly, if

23:23

anyone's ever listened to the Jimi Hendrix Experience albums

23:25

and wondered why that band was so bad

23:27

at playing songs together, it's almost

23:29

certainly because Cream had already demonstrated

23:32

you didn't have to be able to do that to have a successful

23:35

band. Cream set a precedent

23:37

and it lowered the standard across

23:39

the board to the point where one of the

23:41

best guitarists to ever live phoned

23:45

in a bunch of hack bullshit

23:47

tapes together, spliced together recordings.

23:50

People think that's genius. Can you imagine

23:52

the albums we would have from Jimi Hendrix? If

23:55

Eric Clapton, Jack Bruce and Ginger

23:58

Baker hadn't made this. the

24:00

gold standard. Yeah, that's the power.

24:03

Something going so big is

24:05

that influences so many other people that

24:07

change the trajectory of

24:09

what they're making because I don't know with

24:12

podcasts, listenership, understand this,

24:14

but a lot of musicians just

24:16

want to be rich and famous. So

24:19

they're gonna follow the trend.

24:21

Follow the leader, man. Exactly. So if cream

24:24

rises to the top, pun and fucking

24:26

tended, then yeah, they're

24:29

gonna dumb their shit down because

24:31

they too want to be fucking rich

24:33

and famous. The greatest

24:35

contribution of cream to music

24:38

is they made so much other music

24:40

worth, the influence

24:43

of their guitar players to be worse.

24:45

You want to be rich, you want to be famous, you want to sell

24:48

as many albums as us, you need

24:50

to suck more. It's not

24:52

much of a surprise that cream had such a hard

24:55

time keeping songs together because

24:57

as I alluded to earlier, their rhythm

24:59

section absolutely hated each other. In

25:01

fact, that may be the only thing Jack

25:03

Bruce and Ginger Baker ever agreed on was

25:06

that they hated each other. One time

25:08

Ginger Baker threatened Jack Bruce with

25:10

a knife in the middle

25:13

of a concert. Pretty awesome,

25:15

dude. If this was a punk rock band,

25:18

I'd be like, that's fucking hard as hell, but

25:20

it's not. It's a fake blues rock band, so it

25:22

doesn't actually work out as to be as cool. Now,

25:24

if he smashed a beer bottle over his head

25:27

and didn't threaten me, I might be like, that's kind of cool,

25:29

but threatening him with a knife and you're not a punk rock

25:32

band, I mean. He may have been threatened

25:34

by a British guy. No, I think so. Fuck

25:37

off. If you're not Jason Statham, I don't

25:39

care. Obviously, the general

25:42

public and most music critics are

25:44

too ignorant to be able to tell the difference between

25:46

the first guy they've ever

25:49

heard play blues riffs on a Gibson

25:51

through loud as fuck and recently invented

25:53

Marshall amplifiers and

25:55

Jimi Hendrix coming along to do the same

25:58

thing.

25:58

But a lot of them have actually,

25:59

A lot of people who paid real attention

26:02

to music and a lot of musicians at the time

26:04

could certainly tell the difference.

26:07

It's not like the modern backlash

26:09

against Cream is a result of Eric Clapton's

26:12

dreadful solo career or anything like that. There

26:14

were definitely people who hated this at the time. They

26:17

just weren't the tastemakers. They just weren't the people with

26:19

the platforms. They were playing real

26:21

music in a recording studio or a jazz club

26:23

somewhere in front of 45 people like Jeff

26:25

Beck has spent his life doing. Richie

26:28

Blackmore of Deep Purple began

26:30

playing sessions for Joe Meek in the year 1960.

26:33

So he was totally around.

26:36

Where and when Cream happened. And

26:38

the nicest thing that he could

26:41

bring himself to say about Clapton's guitar

26:43

playing is that it was competent. Which

26:48

is such a bitchy thing to say

26:50

for one guitar player to

26:52

say about another guitar. That's

26:55

the equivalent of saying this guy sucks. I

26:57

mean if you put him on stage he can technically

27:00

do most of the stuff that you're supposed

27:02

to be able to do. I shouldn't say this but this is the equivalent

27:04

of what I do to people which is when

27:07

people ask me like oh. You should definitely

27:09

not say whatever you're about to say. No, what do you say? Because

27:11

it's funny. When somebody asks you

27:13

like what do you think about this band and you

27:15

go nah they're great guys. Oh the

27:17

nice guy thing? Yeah fuck I love that. I mean everyone

27:19

knows that one. I make fun of that one all the time. They're

27:22

really fantastic people. My dream is for,

27:24

and in real life I'm not an asshole but I do play one

27:26

on TV. My dream is always

27:29

like that guy's such a dick but his

27:31

work is just undeniable. To

27:33

me it's because of the

27:35

nice guy thing and you have to do it my whole life.

27:38

It's the total opposite becomes a compliment

27:40

for me. Like I want people to think he's

27:42

got to be such a dickhead but Jesus he's

27:44

so good at what he does. That's so

27:47

much better. That guy's a complete asshole

27:49

but he's fucking great. Okay well I'm not paying him to be

27:51

nice. I'm paying him to be fucking awesome. I

27:53

didn't buy the album because he's nice. I bought

27:55

it because I want to hear some shit. Play. It's

27:58

like a reaction though to being like. I

28:00

like them as people. I hear someone

28:02

say a version of that probably every

28:05

single day living in Nashville Yeah, I was getting

28:07

to see every single day. Yeah, I don't know if it's

28:09

true everywhere I'm positive that LA

28:11

has the same thing LA and

28:14

New York and New York with comedians

28:16

actors and shit too But it's a really polite way

28:19

of saying they talk. It's an entertainment business way

28:21

of saying Jesus. It's bad, right? Yeah,

28:23

but what's funny is Knowing

28:25

that laying that is the groundwork if

28:28

I said someone was competent to me

28:30

that is basically Word

28:34

that's way worse. It's ultimate. Fuck you

28:37

really I wouldn't even say because I

28:39

would feel bad you're Eric Clapton and you

28:41

find out that someone said you were a competent guitar player You

28:44

would actually wish that they had said you were

28:46

a terrible guitar player Yeah, you could position

28:48

that as professional jealousy

28:51

sure Well, they must just not like

28:53

what I do, but this is this guy

28:55

saying I understand Entirely

28:58

the source material of where he's coming from I

29:00

know exactly what he is practice of what he

29:02

is trying to play and the best thing

29:05

I can say about it Is it is competent?

29:08

Fuck. Holy shit. Rest

29:10

in peace man. Honestly, our IP

29:12

on that like you're fucking dead at that

29:14

point Talk about a fucking knife fight. That's like

29:16

straight stabs of the throat The other

29:18

thing I know people are gonna say we're gonna

29:21

get so many versions of some bullshit like

29:23

well Cream might not be the best

29:25

band ever but look at what music

29:27

was like at the time You've just got to think about what music

29:29

was like at the time as if music

29:32

was just bad back then and that's

29:34

the way That it was in olden days Dude

29:36

a band most of you who are gonna say

29:39

that have probably never heard of or else

29:41

you wouldn't say that The Blues Project

29:43

released their second album Projections

29:46

the month before cream put out their first

29:48

album. This band was already happening

29:51

and they smoke cream in

29:53

every direction Go listen to just

29:56

the first song on the second

29:58

blues project album in any person person with

30:00

decent taste is gonna wonder why you've

30:03

ever heard of the band Cream.

30:05

I have somebody who our main name list maybe someday

30:08

we'll bring him on the podcast because he's really funny. I

30:11

asked him, what do you think about Cream? He's like, nah,

30:13

man, never really my thing. I'm

30:16

gonna be honest with you. I don't, I

30:18

never really got into the blues.

30:20

I don't play an instrument. I don't play guitar. So

30:22

I never really pursued, which I felt,

30:24

you know, I feel like if your guitar plays a great place to try

30:27

to learn, blah, blah, blah, blah. I never did that shit. So

30:29

I never really explored the blues as

30:31

a genre. But when you

30:34

do an episode on Cream, you have to

30:36

listen to a variety of music and

30:39

you quickly realize how much

30:41

other stuff existed that was just

30:43

so much better. There's a handful

30:45

of people that are just undeniably great, but

30:48

then there's so much stuff that's in the middle

30:50

way above Cream. That's the thing is there's

30:52

so many other things that were out at the time

30:54

that should have been way bigger that we would never

30:56

do an episode on. They never got big enough,

30:59

way better guitar players, way better

31:01

musicianship, way better songwriters,

31:04

more interesting. But

31:06

here we are with some of this shit fucking headband.

31:08

The other thing about Cream, specifically

31:10

when it comes to the albums, Hendrix

31:13

released Are You Experience right

31:15

before Cream recorded most of Disraeli

31:17

Gears and Disraeli Gears of the album where

31:19

Cream began working with

31:22

Felix Papalardi, who would later form

31:24

the band Mountain who kicks ass. And

31:26

Disraeli Gears also had Tom Dowd as

31:29

the engineer. I hope everyone listening to this

31:31

already knows how big of a deal Tom Dowd was.

31:34

And if you want to hear why Felix

31:36

Papalardi mattered a lot at

31:38

this time, go listen to the two albums

31:41

he produced and played on for a band

31:43

named The Young Bloods. Just check

31:46

out the song Don't Play Games if you would

31:48

like to learn about a banger you've never

31:50

heard before or you can listen to

31:52

their version of CC Writer to hear exactly

31:55

how a three-piece blues rock band

31:57

doing a guitar solo without rhythm guitar

31:59

should sound. If you listen to

32:01

Disraeli Gears and know the story

32:03

about Hendrix fucking

32:06

Clapton's whole life up during a

32:08

jam session with Cream in Europe, there's

32:11

just no way Cream did not

32:13

bring that Hendrix album into the

32:15

studio and asked studio musicians

32:18

to help them try to do their own version of it.

32:20

I mean, Eric Clapton got a fucking perm to look

32:23

more like Jimi Hendrix. So this is not exactly

32:25

a hairbrained theory. You can just

32:27

listen to the albums to hear it. By

32:30

the way, definitely Google image search

32:32

Eric Clapton with a perm. I know. Actually,

32:35

I looked at old pictures of them. It'll make you

32:37

embarrassed to be white. This

32:39

is brutal. It's even for the time. Everyone

32:42

looked kind of goofy. They are way beyond the pale

32:44

of goofy. Didn't you tell, I feel

32:47

like, maybe you told me off mic

32:49

one time, whatever, but there was like some story that Clapton,

32:52

was it Clapton? They went to go see somebody

32:54

play. No, that's the Hendrix story.

32:56

It was Hendrix. It was like, oh, it was Hendrix. I

32:58

have told it on the podcast before, and I guess I

33:01

should say it. But when

33:03

Hendrix went over to Europe, he

33:06

wanted to play with Cream. Only

33:08

thing he wanted to do, because everyone thought that Eric Clapton

33:10

was the best guitarist or whatever. Hendrix

33:13

wanted to jam with him. And everyone

33:16

over there thought that that was a

33:18

completely insane idea. Like,

33:21

who could possibly be good enough to get on stage

33:23

with Cream? Why would anyone even want to do that? Blah,

33:25

blah, blah, blah, blah. Someone arranges

33:27

it. Hendrix gets up, calls

33:30

off a song, and just starts

33:33

being Jimi Hendrix. Clapton

33:35

can't even play. He's just standing there with his

33:37

hands not doing anything on

33:40

the guitar. He just walks off stage at a certain

33:42

point in the middle of the song. He just leaves. And so now you've got

33:44

Hendrix on stage with the rest of Cream,

33:47

fucking destroying any concept

33:49

of Eric Clapton being a great guitarist.

33:53

Then the story goes that someone went backstage

33:55

and Eric Clapton was back there smoking

33:57

a cigarette. And all he could say was, you never... told

34:00

me he was that fucking good. There

34:02

are other stories like Pete Townsend,

34:06

the first time he saw Hendrix play, he might

34:08

have cried or I

34:10

could practice for the rest of my life and I'm never going to

34:12

be able to do any of that stuff.

34:15

This guy is the end of me. I'm done.

34:17

Obviously that ended up not being the case because again, people

34:20

have generally really bad taste in

34:23

most things, which I'm kind of thankful

34:25

for the people have bad taste because that's why this podcast

34:27

exists. If you all actually like genuinely

34:31

quality music, we wouldn't be able to sit

34:33

here and do this. So thank you and I hope

34:35

you continue to have complete shit taste music.

34:38

To wrap all of this up, we probably cannot

34:41

include a clip without having to deal with YouTube's

34:44

horrible copyright system

34:46

because Cream officially released this as part of a box

34:49

set in the late 90s. But I would

34:51

strongly encourage anyone who's still listening

34:53

to go find the radio commercial

34:55

Cream did for Falstaff

34:58

Beer in the 1960s. No matter how bad

35:02

you think it is, it's so

35:04

much worse. It's so much worse than just letting

35:06

a company use your song. It's so much worse

35:09

than just being in a commercial as a person and saying

35:11

stuff a copywriter wrote for you to say it's

35:14

Cream the band playing

35:17

their bullshit music and Jack

35:19

Bruce singing lyrics that presumably

35:21

he wrote about why you should drink Falstaff

35:24

Beer. It's one of the most

35:26

embarrassing things I've ever heard in my entire life.

35:28

It's extra hilarious too because one of the

35:30

reasons that Eric Clapton said he left

35:33

the band the Yardbirds is because they were getting

35:35

too commercial when what he wanted to play was

35:37

blues songs. He wanted to be a straight

35:40

up hardcore, sick to the way it

35:42

sounds blues guitarist. So

35:45

then he starts the band Cream but

35:47

doesn't know they don't want to have blues songs

35:50

to be able to play. I mean, he's literally

35:52

on record as not being able

35:54

to figure out how to play the song killing floor,

35:57

which is one of the reasons why he was so fucked up

35:59

by Hendrix it with Cream. That's the song

36:01

that Hendrix started playing when he sat in with Cream. It

36:03

was a song that Clapton couldn't wrap

36:05

his head around being able to play.

36:08

Instead of being a blues band, Cream

36:10

has to become a half-assed

36:13

jam band until Eric Clapton

36:15

figures out he's not good enough at guitar to play

36:17

improvised solos night after night. So they

36:20

make a fucking beer commercial and

36:22

then he goes on to have a solo career full of such

36:25

middle-of-the-road adult contemporary commercial

36:27

music that he makes the Yardbirds, a

36:29

band he said was getting too commercial,

36:31

sound like fucking MC5.

36:34

What a career arc, man. Holy

36:36

shit. The thing is is that someday

36:39

we're going to do Eric Clapton episode

36:41

where we continue on to the future

36:43

of Eric Clapton and all the shit

36:46

that he decided to bestow upon

36:48

the world. That's going to be a long episode. I mean, I

36:50

think this is something that I've realized

36:53

over all the episodes that we've done. This

36:55

podcast and doing this podcast has reiterated this

36:58

even more to me. Artists, especially

37:00

musicians, want to present themselves

37:02

as being very serious people.

37:04

I'm very serious about my guitar

37:07

playing or my songwriting. I

37:09

take this very fucking serious and

37:11

then they do a goddamn commercial for

37:14

McDonald's or a beer,

37:16

which is fine. Get paid. But

37:20

it's really hard to present yourself

37:22

as this really serious. I take

37:25

my art super fucking serious, but

37:27

also doing this Burger King commercial

37:30

in the same breath. It doesn't mesh.

37:33

You're already fucking rich.

37:35

You don't need the money from

37:37

the giant corporate whatever interest,

37:40

yet you take it because

37:43

you're a silly little tiny

37:45

person that just loves money. Doing

37:48

dumb ass fucking commercials for Smartwater

37:51

or Vitaminwater or beer

37:53

or fucking McDonald's. The funniest

37:56

thing about the cream beer commercial,

37:58

it must have been a word that. they were using in

38:00

their ads at the time, but

38:03

Jack Bruce keeps talking about how

38:05

Falstaff is the thirst slaker,

38:08

which you don't own a thesaurus.

38:12

That would be like thirst quencher basically,

38:14

but it's the word slaker specifically.

38:17

So he's like, Falstaff,

38:19

the thirst slaker, the

38:22

only beer that slakes your thirst.

38:24

It's just, it's fucking insane

38:26

to listen to. If you find

38:29

this on YouTube, go to the comments.

38:31

It's a bunch of fucking cream fan boys,

38:34

which really a fan grandpa is at this point,

38:36

trying to convince themselves that it's awesome that the

38:38

band did this. They're all like, Holy shit,

38:41

man. If all commercials were like this, I would listen

38:43

to commercials. How cool is it of them

38:45

to do it? It's like, no, guys, this

38:48

is not cool, man. It's so crazy.

38:50

And you didn't like did this. You would

38:53

shit on them relentlessly

38:55

for doing it. Apply your standards

38:57

or don't. Idiotic jingles

39:00

that some asshole in an office

39:02

in New York City wrote for them with

39:04

a smile on their face. I get

39:06

why they do it as a business person, but

39:08

you don't get to be a serious

39:11

fucking artist that takes themselves so serious

39:13

and also sing the fucking

39:15

vitamin water jingle, whatever that may

39:18

be. One of my favorite

39:20

things I found was from an October 1978

39:23

issue of Cream magazine

39:27

that's C R E M magazine. And

39:29

they recently put their entire archive on

39:31

a website and you should start using it. If you

39:33

ever plan on talking about music to anyone, this

39:35

is a magazine who I'm sure a lot

39:37

of people believe named themselves after the band

39:40

cream in 1969, the year after cream,

39:42

the band broke up. But in 1978,

39:46

cream magazines news section at the front

39:48

had a little blurb that began after

39:50

denying the rumor for months. The dreaded

39:53

cream reunion did take place in

39:55

England recently at a polo

39:57

club owned by Ginger Baker. Let

40:00

me tell you people one thing right motherfucking

40:03

now. If you ever at any point

40:05

in your life find yourself the owner

40:08

of a polo club, you definitively

40:11

do not rock. Polo,

40:13

that's the one with horses and mallets

40:16

and stupid hats. Rewind,

40:20

they called it the dreaded cream

40:22

reunion. That

40:24

alone, so funny to me. It's

40:27

such an offhand comment about something

40:29

we all assume that we can all

40:31

agree this is fucking terrible, right?

40:33

I just love that, I love that comment.

40:36

The dreaded cream reunion

40:38

at a fucking polo club, which is the

40:41

equivalent in America of having it, I guess,

40:43

at a country club, which is the

40:45

least blues rock and roll place

40:48

to ever have a fucking rock and roll show ever

40:50

in the history of time. Dude, I think a country

40:52

club would actually be cooler than a polo club.

40:55

Top two worst places in rock and roll. Country club is because of a fucking

40:57

swimming pool. I assume that the only thing going on at a

40:59

polo club is polo. This is the least

41:02

rock and roll place you could possibly

41:04

have a show. If your favorite band

41:06

is cream, your favorite band is not gonna be a club.

41:10

You

41:17

are welcome for listening to another your

41:20

grandpa was always wrong about rock

41:22

music episode of your favorite band sucks.

41:24

We have a new t-shirt

41:27

design in our merch shop.

41:30

It's metal as hell. You're definitely

41:32

gonna wanna own one as soon as you see

41:34

it. So go see it at shop.yfbspod.com.

41:41

Do it today, do not delay, do

41:43

it right now. All right, as

41:45

you may have guessed, Jeff Beck was

41:47

still alive when we recorded this,

41:50

which is why you heard me refer

41:52

to him in the present tense. If

41:54

you're one of those people who really

41:56

only gets into artists after they die.

41:59

It has cleared you to enter your

42:02

Jeff Beck phase. And

42:04

that's about all I need to say in this outro

42:07

as always. If you enjoyed the episode,

42:09

then share it however you feel like, post

42:12

about it, talk about it with your friends, whatever you

42:14

can do to spread the gospel

42:16

of your favorite band sucks. If

42:19

you did not enjoy the episode,

42:21

I am terribly sorry that you're wrong.

42:24

That must be difficult for you on

42:27

a near daily basis, but hey, you'll

42:29

get another chance when the podcast returns

42:32

because we will be addressing further

42:34

facts on the subject of

42:37

... sound garden sucks.