"Pilgrim" is a pop rock song written by the

British British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies. * British national identity, the characteristics of British people and culture ...

musicians

Eric Clapton Eric Patrick Clapton (born 1945) is an English Rock music, rock and blues guitarist, singer, and songwriter. He is regarded as one of the most successful and influential guitarists in rock music. Clapton ranked second in ''Rolling Stone''s l ...

and

Simon Climie Simon Climie (born 7 April 1957) is an English songwriter, musician and record producer. He is best known as the former lead singer of the UK duo Climie Fisher. Biography Climie was born in London. Beginning his career primarily as a songwr ...

. The duo also produced the song, which came about after a

jam session A jam session is a relatively informal musical event, process, or activity where musicians, typically instrumentalists, play improvised solos and vamp over tunes, drones, songs, and chord progressions. To "jam" is to improvise music without ...

between the two in the late 1990s. The title was recorded for Clapton's 1998

studio album An album is a collection of audio recordings (e.g., music) issued on a medium such as compact disc (CD), Phonograph record, vinyl (record), audio tape (like 8-track cartridge, 8-track or Cassette tape, cassette), or digital distribution, dig ...

Pilgrim The asterisk ( ), from Late Latin , from Ancient Greek , , "little star", is a typographical symbol. It is so called because it resembles a conventional image of a heraldic star. Computer scientists and mathematicians often vocalize it as ...

'' and was released as the fourth and final single of the album. The song was always released as a

B-side The A-side and B-side are the two sides of phonograph record, vinyl records and Compact cassette, cassettes, and the terms have often been printed on the labels of two-sided music recordings. The A-side of a Single (music), single usually ...

to another single and was accompanied by a

music video A music video is a video that integrates a song or an album with imagery that is produced for promotion (marketing), promotional or musical artistic purposes. Modern music videos are primarily made and used as a music marketing device intended to ...

. It is part of the ''

Lethal Weapon 4 ''Lethal Weapon 4'' is a 1998 American buddy cop action film directed and produced by Richard Donner, and starring Mel Gibson, Danny Glover, Joe Pesci, Rene Russo, Chris Rock, and Jet Li (in his international film debut). It is the fourth ins ...

'' soundtrack.

Writing and composition

The song is written and recorded in the keys

A minor A minor is a minor scale based on A, B, C, D, E, F, and G. Its key signature has no flats or sharps. Its relative major is C major and its parallel major is A major. The A natural minor scale is: Changes needed for the melodic ...

and

C major C major is a major scale based on C, consisting of the pitches C, D, E, F, G, A, and B. C major is one of the most common keys used in music. Its key signature has no flats or sharps. Its relative minor is A minor and its parallel min ...

. In 1998, Clapton talked about the composition and writing process on "Pilgrim" a song like "Inside of Me" that was deliberately borrowed from

Curtis Mayfield Curtis Lee Mayfield (June 3, 1942 – December 26, 1999) was an American singer-songwriter, guitarist, and record producer. Dubbed the " Gentle Genius", he is considered one of the most influential musicians of soul and socially conscious Afric ...

as a way for Clapton to say thanks for the inspiration: "I was playing

guitar The guitar is a stringed musical instrument that is usually fretted (with Fretless guitar, some exceptions) and typically has six or Twelve-string guitar, twelve strings. It is usually held flat against the player's body and played by strumming ...

and Simon limiewas playing keyboards and we just created an atmosphere and instantly the words were coming into my head because the mood evoked all of the circumstances that had been happening for the past few years... not judgmental... it states what had had been happening in a very gentle loving way. This was an actual event in my life where people were saying to me 'Look you've got to get out of this. You've got to let go. You've got to move on'. There was an endless vicious circle of make-ups, break-ups, make-ups, and it went on for years and it was going nowhere. It was very painful but I was obsessed with the notion that it would come to fruition if I just stayed there long enough. I'm sure we've all been there – but this time for me it was different. That's another one of the things where I can say that if I just stay there it will come good and it didn't. We used

drum loops In music, a loop is a repeating section of sound material. Short sections can be repeated to create ostinato patterns. Longer sections can also be repeated: for example, a player might loop what they play on an entire verse of a song in order to ...

... turned to technology when we ran out of things to do and needed a place to start. We would say something like 'uh, well, um, have you heard the new Usher single?' And from there we'd just copy the drum program, dicker with it and play along with it. That's how the song "Pilgrim" was born. We came up with a drum program that was derived from a hit – I can't remember which one – we changed it a little and then wrote the words".

Personnel

Musicians: *

– lead vocals, guitar *

Paul Carrack Paul Melvyn Carrack (born 22 April 1951) is an English singer, musician, songwriter and composer who has recorded as both a solo artist and as a member of several popular bands. The BBC dubbed Carrack "The Man with the Golden Voice", while '' ...

– organ *

– synth bass (maybe), drum machine, backing vocals *Chyna Whyne – backing vocals *

The London Session Orchestra The London Session Orchestra was a film, TV, and pop orchestra based in London. It was founded in 1993 and led by Gavyn Wright and is known for its work on movies such as ''Run Lola Run'' (1998) ''V for Vendetta'' (2005), and '' Mission: Impossibl ...

– strings *

Nick Ingman Nicholas Ingman (born 29 April 1948) is an English arranger, composer and conductor in the commercial music field. His collaborators include Paul McCartney, Mick Jagger, Björk, and the British X-factor. Born and educated in London, Ingman move ...

– string arrangements Technical: *Eric Clapton – producer *Simon Climie – producer * Alan Douglas – engineer *Adam Brown – assistant engineer *

Mick Guzauski Nathan "Mick" Guzauski is an American multi-platinum mixing engineer and sound engineer. He has nine Grammy Awards and eleven nominations. His work spans a wide range of styles, including jazz, R&B, Latin, rock, pop, easy listening, funk and ...

– mixer

Chart positions

Weekly charts

Music video

A music video was released in 1998 to accompany the single release. The video is still being broadcast on TV networks like

MTV MTV (an initialism of Music Television) is an American cable television television channel, channel and the flagship property of the MTV Entertainment Group sub-division of the Paramount Media Networks division of Paramount Global. Launched on ...

VH1 VH1 (originally an initialism for Video Hits One) is an American basic cable television network that launched on January 1, 1985, and is currently owned by the MTV Entertainment Group unit of Paramount Global's networks division based in New Y ...

and

Much Music Much is a Canadian English language discretionary specialty channel owned by BCE Inc. through its Bell Media subsidiary that airs programming aimed at teenagers and young adults. It is headquartered at 299 Queen Street West in what was o ...

. The music video was also released on the

DVD The DVD (common abbreviation for digital video disc or digital versatile disc) is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 1995 and first released on November 1, 1996, in Japan. The medium can store any ki ...

to the 1999

compilation album A compilation album comprises Album#Tracks, tracks, which may be previously released or unreleased, usually from several separate recordings by either one Performing arts#Performers, performer or by several performers. If the recordings are from ...

'' Clapton Chronicles: The Best of Eric Clapton''.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Pilgrim 1998 singles 1998 songs Eric Clapton songs Reprise Records singles Songs written by Eric Clapton Warner Records singles Songs written by Simon Climie Lethal Weapon (franchise)