Cream were a
British rock supergroup formed in London in 1966. The group consisted of bassist
Jack Bruce, guitarist
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 drummer
Ginger Baker
Peter Edward "Ginger" Baker (19 August 1939 – 6 October 2019) was an English drummer. His work in the 1960s and 1970s earned him the reputation of "rock's first superstar drummer", for a style that melded jazz and Music of Africa, Africa ...
. Bruce was the primary songwriter and vocalist, although Clapton and Baker contributed to songs. Formed by members of previously successful bands, they are widely considered the first supergroup. Cream were highly regarded for the instrumental proficiency of each of their members.
During their brief three-year career, the band released four albums: ''
Fresh Cream'' (1966), ''
Disraeli Gears'' (1967), ''
Wheels of Fire'' (1968), and ''
Goodbye'' (1969). Beginning with ''Disraeli Gears'', the band was joined in the studio by producer and multi-instrumentalist
Felix Pappalardi. Their music spanned rock styles such as
blues rock
Blues rock is a fusion music genre, genre and form of rock music, rock and blues music that relies on the chords/scales and instrumental improvisation of blues. It is mostly an electric ensemble-style music with instrumentation similar to electri ...
,
psychedelia
Psychedelia usually refers to a Aesthetics, style or aesthetic that is resembled in the psychedelic subculture of the 1960s and the psychedelic experience produced by certain psychoactive substances. This includes psychedelic art, psychedelic ...
, and
hard rock
Hard rock or heavy rock is a heavier subgenre of rock music typified by aggressive vocals and Distortion (music), distorted electric guitars. Hard rock began in the mid-1960s with the Garage rock, garage, Psychedelic rock, psychedelic and blues ...
. Throughout their career, they sold more than 15 million records worldwide. The group's third album, ''Wheels of Fire'' (1968), is the first
platinum-selling double album.
They scored international hits with singles such as "
Sunshine of Your Love" (1967) and "
White Room" (1968).
Tensions between Bruce and Baker led to their decision in May 1968 to break up, although the band were persuaded to make a final album, ''Goodbye'', and to tour, culminating in two final farewell concerts at the
Royal Albert Hall
The Royal Albert Hall is a concert hall on the northern edge of South Kensington, London, England. It has a seating capacity of 5,272.
Since the hall's opening by Queen Victoria in 1871, the world's leading artists from many performance genres ...
on 25 and 26 November 1968 which were filmed and shown in theatres, then in 1977 released as a home video, ''
Farewell Concert''. Bruce died in 2014 followed by Baker in 2019, leaving Clapton as the last living member of the group.
In 1993, Cream were inducted into the
Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. They were included in both ''
Rolling Stone
''Rolling Stone'' is an American monthly magazine that focuses on music, politics, and popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco, California, in 1967 by Jann Wenner and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason.
The magazine was first known fo ...
'' and
VH1's lists of the "100 Greatest Artists of All Time", at number 67 and 61 respectively. They were also ranked number 16 on VH1's "100 Greatest Artists of Hard Rock".
History
Formation (1966)
By July 1966,
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 ...
's career with
the Yardbirds and
John Mayall & the Bluesbreakers had earned him a reputation as one of the premier
blues
Blues is a music genre and musical form that originated among African Americans in the Deep South of the United States around the 1860s. Blues has incorporated spiritual (music), spirituals, work songs, field hollers, Ring shout, shouts, cha ...
guitarists in Britain.
Clapton, however, found the environment of Mayall's band confining, and sought to expand his playing in a new band. In 1966, Clapton met
Ginger Baker
Peter Edward "Ginger" Baker (19 August 1939 – 6 October 2019) was an English drummer. His work in the 1960s and 1970s earned him the reputation of "rock's first superstar drummer", for a style that melded jazz and Music of Africa, Africa ...
, then the drummer of
the Graham Bond Organisation, for which
Jack Bruce had played bass guitar, harmonica and piano. Baker felt stifled in the Graham Bond Organisation and had grown tired of
Graham Bond's drug addictions and bouts of mental instability. "I had always liked Ginger", explained Clapton. "Ginger had come to see me play with the Bluesbreakers. After the gig he drove me back to London in his Rover. I was very impressed with his car and driving. He was telling me that he wanted to start a band, and I had been thinking about it too."
Each was impressed with the other's playing abilities, prompting Baker to ask Clapton to join his new, then-unnamed group. Clapton immediately agreed, on the condition that Baker hire Bruce, who had joined
Manfred Mann
Manfred Mann were an English Rock music, rock band formed in London in 1962. They were named after their keyboardist Manfred Mann (musician), Manfred Mann, who later led the successful 1970s group Manfred Mann's Earth Band. The group had two l ...
since leaving Graham Bond, as the group's bassist;
according to Clapton, Baker was so surprised at the suggestion that he almost crashed the car.
Clapton had met Bruce when the bassist/vocalist briefly played with the Bluesbreakers in November 1965;
the two also had recorded together as part of an ''ad hoc'' group dubbed
Powerhouse (which also included
Steve Winwood and
Paul Jones). Impressed with Bruce's vocals and technical prowess, Clapton wanted to work with him on an ongoing basis.
In contrast, while Bruce was in Bond's band, he and Baker had been notorious for their quarrelling.
Their volatile relationship included on-stage fights and the sabotage of one another's instruments.
After Baker fired Bruce from the band, Bruce continued to arrive for gigs; ultimately, Bruce was driven away from the band after Baker threatened him at knifepoint.
Baker and Bruce tried to put aside their differences for the good of Baker's new trio, which he envisioned as collaborative, with each of the members contributing to music and lyrics. The band was named "Cream", as Clapton, Bruce, and Baker were already considered the "cream of the crop" among blues and jazz musicians in the exploding
British music scene. Before deciding upon "Cream", the band considered calling themselves "Sweet 'n' Sour Rock 'n' Roll".
Of the trio, Clapton had the biggest reputation in England; however, he was unknown in the United States, having left the Yardbirds before "
For Your Love" hit the
American Top Ten.
The band made its unofficial debut at the
Twisted Wheel on 29 July 1966.
Its official debut came two nights later at the Sixth Annual Windsor Jazz & Blues Festival.
Being new and with few original songs to its credit, they performed blues reworkings that thrilled the large crowd and earned it a warm reception. In October the band also got a chance to jam with
Jimi Hendrix
James Marshall "Jimi" Hendrix (born Johnny Allen Hendrix; November 27, 1942September 18, 1970) was an American singer-songwriter and musician. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest and most influential guitarists of all time. Inducted ...
, who had recently arrived in London. Hendrix was a fan of Clapton's music and wanted a chance to play with him onstage.
It was during the early organisation that they decided Bruce would serve as the group's lead vocalist. While Clapton was shy about singing, he occasionally harmonised with Bruce, and in time, took lead vocals on several Cream tracks including "
Four Until Late", "
Strange Brew", "World of Pain", "
Outside Woman Blues", "Crossroads", and "
Badge".
''Fresh Cream'' (1966)
The band's debut album, ''
Fresh Cream'', was recorded and released in 1966. The album reached number 6 in the UK charts and number 39 in the US. It was evenly split between self-penned originals and blues covers, including "Four Until Late", "
Rollin' and Tumblin'", "Spoonful", "
I'm So Glad"
and "Cat's Squirrel". The rest of the songs were written by either Jack Bruce or Ginger Baker. ("I Feel Free", a UK hit single,
was included on only the American edition of the LP.) The track "
Toad" contained one of the earliest examples of a drum solo in rock music as
Ginger Baker
Peter Edward "Ginger" Baker (19 August 1939 – 6 October 2019) was an English drummer. His work in the 1960s and 1970s earned him the reputation of "rock's first superstar drummer", for a style that melded jazz and Music of Africa, Africa ...
expanded upon his early composition "Camels and Elephants", written in 1965 with
the Graham Bond Organisation.

''Disraeli Gears'' (1967)

The band first visited the US in March 1967 to play nine dates at the RKO 58th Street Theatre in New York City. There was little impact, as impresario
Murray the K placed them at the bottom of a six-act bill that performed three times per date, eventually reducing the band to one song per concert. They returned to record ''
Disraeli Gears'' in New York between 11 and 15 May 1967. This, the band's second album, was released in November 1967 and reached the top five in the charts on both sides of the Atlantic. Produced by
Felix Pappalardi (who later co-founded the Cream-influenced hard rock band
Mountain
A mountain is an elevated portion of the Earth's crust, generally with steep sides that show significant exposed bedrock. Although definitions vary, a mountain may differ from a plateau in having a limited summit area, and is usually higher t ...
) and engineer
Tom Dowd, it was recorded at
Atlantic Studios in New York. ''Disraeli Gears'' is often considered to be the band's defining effort, successfully blending psychedelic British rock with American blues.
''Disraeli Gears'' also included "
Sunshine of Your Love", which became the group's highest-charting song, peaking at number five on the U.S. ''
Billboard''
Hot 100.

The album was originally slated for release in the summer of 1967, but the record label opted to scrap the planned cover and repackage it with a new psychedelic cover, designed by artist
Martin Sharp, and the resulting changes delayed its release for several months. The cover was remarkable for the time, with a
psychedelic design patterned over a publicity photo of the trio.
In August 1967, the band played their first headlining dates in the US, first at
The Fillmore in San Francisco and later at
The Pinnacle in Los Angeles. The concerts were a great success and proved very influential on both the band itself and the flourishing
hippie scene surrounding them. Upon discovering a growing listening audience, the band began to stretch out on stage, incorporating more time in their repertoire, some songs reaching jams of twenty minutes. Long, drawn-out jams in numbers like "Spoonful", "N.S.U.", "I'm So Glad", and "Sweet Wine" became live favourites, while songs like "Sunshine of Your Love", "Crossroads", and "Tales of Brave Ulysses" remained reasonably short.
''Wheels of Fire'' (1968)

In 1968 came the band's third release, ''
Wheels of Fire'', which topped the American charts. The album was recorded in a spate of short sessions from July 1967 to June 1968. Still a relative novelty, the double album of two LP records was well-suited to extended solos. The ''Wheels of Fire'' studio recordings showcased the band moving away from the blues and more towards a semi-
progressive rock
Progressive rock (shortened as prog rock or simply prog) is a broad genre of rock music that primarily developed in the United Kingdom through the mid- to late 1960s, peaking in the early-to-mid-1970s. Initially termed " progressive pop", the ...
style highlighted by odd
time signature
A time signature (also known as meter signature, metre signature, and measure signature) is an indication in music notation that specifies how many note values of a particular type fit into each measure ( bar). The time signature indicates th ...
s and various orchestral instruments. However, the band did record
Howlin' Wolf
Chester Arthur Burnett (June 10, 1910January 10, 1976), better known by his stage name Howlin' Wolf, was an American blues singer, guitarist and harmonica player. He was at the forefront of transforming acoustic Delta blues into electric Chica ...
's "
Sitting on Top of the World" and
Albert King's "Born Under a Bad Sign". According to a
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...
interview with Clapton, the record company,
Atco Records
ATCO Records is an American record label founded in 1955. It is owned by Warner Music Group and operates as an imprint of Atlantic Records. After several decades of dormancy and infrequent activity under alternating Warner Music labels, the com ...
, also handling Albert King, asked the band to cover "Born Under a Bad Sign", which became a popular track off the record. The opening song, "
White Room", became a radio staple. Another song, "Politician", was written by the band while waiting to perform live at the BBC.
The album's second disc included three live recordings from the Winterland Ballroom and one from the Fillmore. Clapton's second solo from "Crossroads" has made it to the top 20 in multiple "greatest guitar solo" lists.
After the completion of ''Wheels of Fire'' in mid-1968, the band members had grown tired of their exhausting touring schedule and increasingly loud jamming, and wanted to go their separate ways. Baker stated in a 2006 interview with ''Music Mart'' magazine, "It just got to the point where Eric said to me: 'I've had enough of this', and I said so have I. I couldn't stand it. The last year with Cream was just agony. It damaged my hearing permanently, and today I've still got a hearing problem because of the sheer volume throughout the last year of Cream. But it didn't start off like that. In 1966, it was great. It was really a wonderful experience musically, and it just went into the realms of stupidity." Bruce and Baker's combustible relationship proved even worse as a result of the strain put upon the band by non-stop touring, forcing Clapton to play the perpetual role of peacekeeper.
Clapton had also become interested in the music of
Bob Dylan
Bob Dylan (legally Robert Dylan; born Robert Allen Zimmerman, May 24, 1941) is an American singer-songwriter. Described as one of the greatest songwriters of all time, Dylan has been a major figure in popular culture over his nearly 70-year ...
's former backing group, now known as
the Band, and their debut album, ''
Music from Big Pink'',
which proved to be a welcome breath of fresh air to Clapton in comparison to the psychedelia and volume that had defined Cream. Furthermore, he had read a scathing Cream review in ''
Rolling Stone
''Rolling Stone'' is an American monthly magazine that focuses on music, politics, and popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco, California, in 1967 by Jann Wenner and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason.
The magazine was first known fo ...
'', a publication he had much admired, in which the reviewer,
Jon Landau, called him a "master of the blues cliché".
In the wake of that article, Clapton wanted to end Cream and pursue a different musical direction.
At the beginning of the band's farewell tour on 4 October 1968, in Oakland, California, nearly the entire set consisted of songs from ''Wheels of Fire'': "White Room", "Politician", "Crossroads", "Spoonful", and "Deserted Cities of the Heart", with "Passing the Time" taking the place of "Toad" for a drum solo. "Passing the Time" and "Deserted Cities" were quickly removed from the setlist and replaced by "Sitting on Top of the World" and "Toad".
''Goodbye'' and break-up (1968–1969)
From its creation, Cream was faced with some fundamental problems that would later lead to its dissolution in November 1968. The antagonism between Bruce and Baker created tensions in the band. Clapton also felt that the members of the band did not listen to each other enough. Equipment during these years had also improved; new
Marshall amplifier stacks produced more power, and Jack Bruce pushed the volume levels higher, creating tension for Baker, who would have trouble competing with roaring stacks. Clapton spoke of a concert during which he stopped playing and neither Baker nor Bruce noticed.
Clapton has also commented that Cream's later gigs mainly consisted of its members showing off.
Cream decided that they would break up in May 1968 during a tour of the US.
Later, in July, the band announced that they would break up after a farewell tour of the US and after playing two concerts in London. Jack Bruce was quoted as saying "Travel can kill a group. It becomes boring, tiring and very depressing."
Cream were eventually persuaded to do one final album, appropriately titled ''
Goodbye''. The album was recorded in late 1968 and released in early 1969, after the band had broken up. It comprised six songs: three live recordings dating from a concert at
The Forum in Los Angeles, California, on 19 October, and three new studio recordings (including "Badge", which was written by Clapton and
George Harrison, who also played rhythm guitar and was credited as "L'Angelo Misterioso"). "I'm So Glad" was included among the live tracks.
Cream's farewell tour consisted of 22 shows at 19 venues in the US from 4 October to 4 November 1968, and two final farewell concerts at the
Royal Albert Hall
The Royal Albert Hall is a concert hall on the northern edge of South Kensington, London, England. It has a seating capacity of 5,272.
Since the hall's opening by Queen Victoria in 1871, the world's leading artists from many performance genres ...
on 25 and 26 November 1968. The final US gig was at the
Rhode Island Auditorium on 4 November. The band arrived late, and due to local restrictions, were able to perform only two songs, "Toad" and a 20+ minute version of "Spoonful". The two Royal Albert Hall concerts were filmed for a
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...
documentary and released on video (and later DVD) as ''
Farewell Concert''. Both shows were sold out and attracted more attention than any other Cream concert, but their performance was regarded by many as below standard. Baker himself said of the concerts: "It wasn't a good gig ... Cream was better than that ... We knew it was all over. We knew we were just finishing it off, getting it over with." Bruce had three Marshall stacks on stage for the farewell shows but one acted only as a spare, and he only used one or two, depending on the song.
In an interview from ''Cream: Classic Artists'', he added that the band was getting worse by the minute.
Post-Cream
Blind Faith
Blind Faith were an English rock supergroup that consisted of Steve Winwood, Eric Clapton, Ginger Baker, and Ric Grech. They followed the success of each of the member's former bands, including Clapton and Baker's former group Cream and ...
, a band that included both Clapton and Baker, was formed after the demise of Cream, following an attempt by Clapton to recruit
Steve Winwood into Cream in the hope that he would help act as a buffer between Bruce and Baker.
Inspired by more song-based acts, Clapton went on to perform very different, less improvisational material with
Delaney & Bonnie,
Derek and the Dominos, and in his own long and varied solo career.
Bruce began a varied and successful solo career with the 1969 release of ''
Songs for a Tailor'', while Baker formed a jazz-fusion ensemble,
Ginger Baker's Air Force, from the remnants of Blind Faith, with Winwood, Blind Faith bassist
Rick Grech, Graham Bond on saxophone, and guitarist
Denny Laine of
the Moody Blues and (later)
Wings.
All three members continued to explore new musical ideas and partnerships, play concerts and record music for over four decades after ending Cream.
Reunions
Rock and Roll Hall of Fame

In 1993, Cream were inducted into the
Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and re-formed to perform at the
induction ceremony.
Initially, the trio were wary about performing, until encouraging words from
Robbie Robertson inspired them to try. The set consisted of "Sunshine of Your Love", "Crossroads", and "Born Under a Bad Sign", a song they had previously played live just three times. Clapton mentioned in his acceptance speech that their rehearsal the day before the ceremony had marked the first time they had played together in 25 years.
This performance spurred rumours of a reunion tour. Bruce and Baker said in later interviews that they were, indeed, interested in touring as Cream. A formal reunion did not take place immediately, as Clapton, Bruce and Baker continued to pursue solo projects, although the latter two worked together again in the mid-1990s as two-thirds of the power trio
BBM with Irish
blues rock
Blues rock is a fusion music genre, genre and form of rock music, rock and blues music that relies on the chords/scales and instrumental improvisation of blues. It is mostly an electric ensemble-style music with instrumentation similar to electri ...
guitarist
Gary Moore.
2005 concerts
At Clapton's request, Cream reunited for a series of four shows, on 2, 3, 5, and 6 May 2005 at the Royal Albert Hall in London, the venue of their final concerts in 1968.
Although the three musicians chose not to speak publicly about the shows, Clapton would later state that he had become more "generous" in regard to his past, and that the physical health of Bruce and Baker was a major factor:
Bruce had recently undergone a transplant for liver cancer in 2003, and had almost lost his life, while Baker had severe arthritis.
Tickets for all four shows sold out in under an hour. The performances were recorded for a live CD and DVD. Among those in attendance were
Bill Wyman,
Steve Winwood,
Paul McCartney
Sir James Paul McCartney (born 18 June 1942) is an English singer, songwriter and musician who gained global fame with the Beatles, for whom he played bass guitar and the piano, and shared primary songwriting and lead vocal duties with John ...
,
Ringo Starr
Sir Richard Starkey (born 7 July 1940), known professionally as Ringo Starr, is an English musician, songwriter and actor who achieved international fame as the drummer for the Beatles. Starr occasionally sang lead vocals with the group, us ...
,
Roger Waters
George Roger Waters (born 6 September 1943) is an English musician and singer-songwriter. In 1965, he co-founded the rock band Pink Floyd as the bassist. Following the departure of the group's main songwriter Syd Barrett in 1968, Waters became ...
,
Brian May
Sir Brian Harold May (born 19 July 1947) is an English musician, songwriter, record producer, animal welfare activist and astrophysics, astrophysicist. He achieved global fame as the lead guitarist and backing vocalist of the rock band Queen ...
,
Jimmy Page
James Patrick Page (born 9 January 1944) is an English musician and producer who achieved international success as the guitarist and founder of the Rock music, rock band Led Zeppelin.
Page began his career as a studio session musician in Lo ...
, and
Mick Taylor. The reunion marked the first time the band had played "Badge" and "Pressed Rat and Warthog" live.
Inspired by the success of the reunion, the band agreed to an additional set of three shows at the
Madison Square Garden
Madison Square Garden, colloquially known as the Garden or by its initials MSG, is a multi-purpose indoor arena in New York City. It is located in Midtown Manhattan between Seventh Avenue (Manhattan), Seventh and Eighth Avenue (Manhattan), Eig ...
in New York City, from 24 to 26 October 2005. According to Clapton, these concerts did not live up to the Royal Albert Hall performances due to, among other reasons, lack of rehearsal and the resurgence of old grudges among band members.
Post-2005
In February 2006, Cream received a
Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award
The Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award is a special Grammy Award
The Grammy Awards, stylized as GRAMMY, and often referred to as The Grammys, are awards presented by The Recording Academy of the United States to recognize outstanding achiev ...
in recognition of their contribution to, and influence upon, modern music. That same month, a "Classic Albums" DVD was released detailing the story behind the creation and recording of ''Disraeli Gears''. On the day prior to the Grammy ceremony, Bruce made a public statement that more one-off performances of Cream had been planned: multiple dates in a few cities, similar to the Royal Albert Hall and Madison Square Garden shows.
However, this story was denied by both Clapton and Baker, first by Clapton in ''
The Times
''The Times'' is a British Newspaper#Daily, daily Newspaper#National, national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its modern name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its si ...
'' in April 2006. When asked about Cream, Clapton said: "No. Not for me. We did it and it was fun. But life is too short. I've got lots of other things I would rather do, including staying at home with my kids. The thing about that band was that it was all to do with its limits ... it was an experiment." In an interview in the UK magazine ''Music Mart'', about the release of a DVD about the
Blind Faith
Blind Faith were an English rock supergroup that consisted of Steve Winwood, Eric Clapton, Ginger Baker, and Ric Grech. They followed the success of each of the member's former bands, including Clapton and Baker's former group Cream and ...
concert in
Hyde Park 1969, Baker commented about his unwillingness to continue the Cream reunion. These comments were far more specific and explosive than Clapton's, as they were centred around his relationship with Jack Bruce. Ginger said, "When he's Dr. Jekyll, he's fine ... It's when he's Mr. Hyde that he's not. And I'm afraid he's still the same. I tell you this – there won't ever be any more Cream gigs, because he did Mr. Hyde in New York last year."
[lowhandGinger Baker Interview"/>
When asked to elaborate, Baker replied:
Bruce told Detroit's WCSX radio station in May 2007 that there were plans for a Cream reunion later in the year. It was later revealed that the potential performance was to be November 2007 in London as a tribute to Ahmet Ertegun. The band decided against it and this was confirmed by Bruce in a letter to the editor of the Jack Bruce fanzine, ''The Cuicoland Express'', dated 26 September 2007:
The headlining act for the O2 Arena Ahmet Ertegun Tribute Concert (postponed to December 2007) turned out to be from another reunited English hard-rock act, ]Led Zeppelin
Led Zeppelin were an English rock music, rock band formed in London in 1968. The band comprised vocalist Robert Plant, guitarist Jimmy Page, bassist-keyboardist John Paul Jones (musician), John Paul Jones and drummer John Bonham. With a he ...
. Baker and Bruce appeared on stage in London in December 2008, when Baker was awarded a lifetime achievement award by legendary cymbal manufacturer Zildjian. In an interview with BBC 6 Music in April 2010, Bruce confirmed that there would be no more Cream shows, stating simply, "Cream is over." Bruce died on 25 October 2014 and Baker died on 6 October 2019, leaving Clapton as the last surviving member.
Style and legacy
The members of Cream were described by Richie Unterberger of AllMusic
AllMusic (previously known as All-Music Guide and AMG) is an American online database, online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on Musical artist, musicians and Mus ...
as " earningto break free of the confines of the standard rock/ R&B/blues
Blues is a music genre and musical form that originated among African Americans in the Deep South of the United States around the 1860s. Blues has incorporated spiritual (music), spirituals, work songs, field hollers, Ring shout, shouts, cha ...
group". He described the band's first album '' Fresh Cream'' as "electrified and amped-up traditional blues", and described the band's second album '' Disraeli Gears'' as "invigorating, sometimes beguiling hard-driving psychedelic pop" that used "expected, crunching" guitar riffs. According to Hugh of ''Classic Rock
Classic rock is a radio format that developed from the album-oriented rock (AOR) format in the early 1980s. In the United States, it comprises rock music ranging generally from the mid-1960s through the early-1990s, primarily focusing on comm ...
'', "Cream pioneered a fusion of rock, blues and jazz that directly influenced an entire generation of musicians and therefore the course of rock music over the next decade. And the legacy continues to filter down." He also assessed, "Before Cream ormed
William Ormed ( fl. 1395), was an English Member of Parliament (MP).
He was a Member of the Parliament of England
The Parliament of England was the legislature of the Kingdom of England from the 13th century until 1707 when it was replaced ...
in 1966, most British pop music stuck pretty rigidly to a verse/ chorus format, and any instrumental solo was generally confined to repeating the melody. Cream changed all that. ..They took the two-note riff that comprised Willie Dixon’s ''Spoonful'' and stretched it from two-and-a-half minutes to six-and-a-half, exaggerated it, and improvised all around it with a dazzling display of virtuoso playing." Baker and Bruce’s styles were rooted in jazz, while Clapton brought a blues background to the fore. Fielder wrote, "Clapton may not have had the musical knowledge and technique that Baker and Bruce possessed, but he had a God-given gift that enabled the group to justify their audacious name."
Jim Sullivan of NPR conferred the titles of "rock’s most legendary power trio" and "arguably ock music'sfirst supergroup" on Cream.
Dave Navarro of Jane’s Addiction has cited Cream as an influence.
Personnel
Band members
* Ginger Baker
Peter Edward "Ginger" Baker (19 August 1939 – 6 October 2019) was an English drummer. His work in the 1960s and 1970s earned him the reputation of "rock's first superstar drummer", for a style that melded jazz and Music of Africa, Africa ...
– drums, percussion, backing and lead vocals (died 2019)
* Jack Bruce – lead and backing vocals, bass guitar, keyboards, piano, harmonica, cello, acoustic guitar, recorder (died 2014)
* 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 ...
– lead and rhythm guitars, lead and backing vocals
Session contributors
* Pete Brown – lyrics, co songwriter (1966–1969; died 2023)
* Felix Pappalardi – production, viola, bells, organ, trumpet, tonette
The stub-ended Swanson tonette is a small (6" cavity), end-blown vessel flute made of plastic, which was once popular in American elementary music education. Though the tonette has been superseded by the recorder (musical instrument), recorder i ...
, mellotron
The Mellotron is an electro-mechanical musical instrument developed in Birmingham, England, in 1963. It is played by pressing its keys, each of which causes a length of magnetic tape to contact a Capstan (tape recorder), capstan, which pulls i ...
, piano, bass (1967–1969; died 1983)
* Mike Taylor - co-songwriter (1968; died 1969)
* George Harrison – rhythm guitar, co-songwriter (1969; died 2001)
Discography
* '' Fresh Cream'' (1966)
* '' Disraeli Gears'' (1967)
* '' Wheels of Fire'' (1968)
* '' Goodbye'' (1969)
See also
* Album era
The album era (sometimes, album-rock era) was a period in popular music, usually defined as the mid-1960s through the mid-2000s, in which the album—a collection of songs issued on physical media—was the dominant form of recorded music expr ...
References
External links
Ginger Baker's official website
Jack Bruce's official website
Eric Clapton's official website
*
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Cream
1966 establishments in England
1968 disestablishments in England
British acid rock music groups
Atco Records artists
British rhythm and blues boom musicians
British rock music supergroups
English blues rock musical groups
English hard rock musical groups
English musical trios
English psychedelic rock music groups
Eric Clapton
Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award winners
Hard rock musical groups from London
Musical groups disestablished in 1968
Musical groups established in 1966
Polydor Records artists
Reprise Records artists
RSO Records artists