Posts Tagged ‘Disraeli Gears’

CREAM – ” Sunshine Of Your Love “

Posted: January 20, 2018 in MUSIC
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Cream’s Ray Of ‘Sunshine’

In their short time as a band the supergroup, Cream were one of the top album bands on the British, and indeed the world, rock scene. But they also amassed quite a sequence of hit singles, and in this week in 1968, they debuted on  with one of their signature songs, ‘Sunshine Of Your Love.’

The trio had four previous UK singles chart entries to their name, including two top 20 hits, but ‘Sunshine’ gave them their first-ever appearance on the charts. In their own country, ‘Wrapping Paper’ announced their arrival in the autumn of 1966, reaching a modest No. 34, after which ‘I Feel Free’ hit No. 11 and ‘Strange Brew’ No. 17. ‘Anyone For Tennis’all spent three weeks on the survey in June of 1968, reaching No. 40.

‘Sunshine Of Your Love’ was composed by the prolific Cream writing team of bassist Jack Bruce and his lyric-writing collaborator Pete Brown with Eric Clapton. Clapton’s brilliant guitar solo on the recording contains a conscious reference to the Marcels’ rock ‘n’ roll classic ‘Blue Moon,’ highlighting the song’s amorous theme of a “dawn surprise.”

 

This classic rock anthem was introduced on Cream’s second album Disraeli Gears late in 1967, then became Cream’s biggest transatlantic single and their one gold-selling single in the States. It first reached No. 36 there in a 14-week run starting on 13th January 1968, but re-entered the top 100 in July and climbed all the way to No. 5. It later won a place in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.

That US success prompted the UK release of ‘Sunshine,’ as a single the better part of a year after Disraeli Gears appeared. But the track has become a rock standard, performed live by both Bruce, before his passing, and Clapton on countless occasions. The classic status of ‘Sunshine’ has also been underlined in scores of cover versions, by everyone from Ozzy Osbourne to Santana.

CREAM – ” Disraeli Gears ” Classic Albums Released 2nd November 1967

Posted: November 3, 2016 in CLASSIC ALBUMS, MUSIC
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“Disraeli Gears” is the second studio album by the British rock band Cream. It was released in November 1967. The album features the two singles “Strange Brew” and “Sunshine of Your Love”. The album was recorded at Atlantic Studios in New York during May 1967, following the band’s nine shows as part of Murray the K’s “Music in the 5th Dimension” concert series. The sessions were produced by the future Mountain bassist Felix Pappalardi  who also co-wrote the tracks “Strange Brew” and “World of Pain” with wife Gail Collins and were engineered by Tom Dowd According to Dowd the recording sessions took only three and a half days.

Disraeli Gears that turned Cream into a “supergroup.” Here they pursue the psychedelic ideals of the era with total abandon (the LP cover art still stands as one of the 1960s’ most striking designs), merging these ideals with their take on the blues and adorning the amalgamation with some superb pop craftsmanship. Of the 11 originals here, four–“Tales of Brave Ulysses”, “SWLABR”, “Strange Brew” and “Sunshine of Your Love”–earned major airplay. This, their excess-free greatest moment, does the Cream legend proud. “Disraeli Gears” features the group veering away, quite heavily, from their blues roots and indulging in more psychedelic sounds. The most blues-like tunes on the album are the remake of “Outside Woman Blues”, the Bruce/Brown composition “Take it Back” which had been inspired by the contemporary media images of American students burning their draft cards which featured harmonica work by Jack Bruce, and the opening track “Strange Brew” which was based on a 12-bar blues song called “Lawdy Mama” and featured Eric Clapton copying an Albert King guitar solo, note for note

The album title started as a joke. Mick Turner one of Cream’s roadies was discussing with drummer, Ginger Baker, how he fancied one of those bikes with’ Disraeli gears’. He meant, of course, derailleur gears, but the band found the mistake hilarious and so the name of one of one of the UK’s premier psychedelic albums was born.

For this Second album it was far different. Chemicals had been imbibed, Clapton had struck up a friendship with Australian artist Martin Sharp who not only provided the lyrics of “Tales Of Brave Ulysses” but also came up with the splendidly baroque cover. Meanwhile Jack Bruce was now working with underground poet, Pete Brown, whose lyrics were equally trippy. “SWLABR” (it stands for ‘She walks like a bearded rainbow’), “Dance The Night Away” and “Sunshine Of Your Love” were perfect encapsulations of the point where the blues got psychedelic and in turn got heavy. “Sunshine…”’s riff is at once iconic and defines the power trio aesthetic that was to prove so popular with the band’s many disciples.

The other creative catalyst was producer Felix Pappalardi. Co-writing both “World Of Pain” he also helped transform the blueswailing “Lawdy Mama” into the slinky “Strange Brew” – a contender for best album opener of all time. Clapton’s guitar had by now been exposed to the effects heavy stylings of Jimi Hendrix and his heavy use of wah-wah gives Disraeli Gears just the right amount of weirdness, making this probably the most experimental album he ever made. The modish inclusion of Ginger Baker’s rendition of “A Mother’s lament” was the edwardiana icing on the cake.