Cream
“Heh, he said ‘cream.’ Heh, heh…” – Butthead
“Because of the light shows, you felt that there was a great deal of pressure taken off you to be anything more than soundtrack music. It was a whole environmental thing, and you could look at the audience and see that they were all spaced out of their minds. You could do anything you liked, really, as long as it was pretty good. The worst thing you could have done was go on and play 25 three-minute songs. That wouldn't have worked at all with the lights and the stoned atmosphere. So it had to be long, drawn-out mood music.” – Eric Clapton, on why Cream jammed for so long on stage
“’Toad’ fucking rules…if you’re retarted!” – Capn Marvel, in response
Albums Reviewed:
Mmmmm, first reviews in two and a
half months! Smells good. And where have I been, you ask? Well, I went to
So,
Cream. An interesting band, Cream
is. The first real “supergroup” of
sorts, thus paving the way for Asia and Coverdale/Page and others after them,
they also have the reputation as the progenitors of hard rock/heavy metal Led
Zeppelin/what have you groups of the late 60’s and early 70’s. Basically, this means they were the first
honky white guys from
So what did Cream do to compensate? They reworked and covered old blues standards, and they jammed! Oh lord did they jam. See, Cream is basically two bands. The band that wrote “Strange Brew” and “White Room” and “Swlabr” and all their other great little poppy psychedelic blues-rock singles as well as hit-or-miss goofy drug-influenced novelty dip-songs like “Blue Condition,” and the band on the live half of Wheels of Fire, the band that can tear your face off with “Crossroads,” but prefers to perform long and bloated-beyond-belief jams, and then finish it off with Ginger Baker soloing for 20 minutes while you attempt, out of sheer boredom, to eat your own head. Cream jams are something you either love or hate, basically. Unless, that is, you’re me. Because I like them! But I don’t love them. I recognize that they’re samey and long-winded and structureless, but the musicianship the band’s three members display during them is sometimes jaw-dropping to yours truly. Essentially, Cream jams sound like this: they’ll play the opening part to whatever song they’re supposed to be doing a few times, then one of them (usually Eric) will go off on a bluesy solo, then another, and then soon all three guys are basically soloing at the same time. Eric is doing some nimble-fingered blues-scale crap, Jack has his bass turned up to about 26 and is trying to overpower everyone else on stage (which is my favorite part of the jams, actually), and Ginger is, um, soloing too, usually in a jazz-influenced way. But he’s the drummer, so I don’t pay attention to him unless he’s soloing by himself, and that’s when I try to eat my own head. So, if you don’t mind talented musicians going off on random tangents for 10 minutes, Cream jams are just fine. It’s Cream’s songwriting I take issue with. Their ceiling is high, but their quantity and consistency, to me, is lacking.
And now the lineup. From left to right in your picture is mega-talented bassist Jack Bruce, mega-talented-but-awful-at-soloing drummer Ginger Baker, and Eric Crapton (Japanese pronunciation), who I’m assuming you’ve all heard of. All of them sang at various points, and while Jack and Eric are fine, Ginger pretty much blows, though I’d still rather listen to his voice than Geddy Lee’s. They were all in other bands before Cream (like the Yardbirds and John Mayall’s Blues Breakers) and after Cream (like Blind Faith and Derek and the Dominoes), but, I mean, who gives a fuck? And I also have no idea who of the three of them wrote what original songs, except that Ginger wrote “Toad,” so I don’t talk about that shit, either, except to take an occasional shot at Ginger Baker. Because, essentially, I don’t care. It’s not like this is the Beatles or anything and who wrote what song actually matters at all. I think I’ll survive if I can’t pinpoint who exactly wrote the lyrics to “Pressed Rat and Warthog.”
And, onto the reviews!
Fresh Cream (1966)
Rating: 6
Best Song: “Spoonful”
Well, I can definitely say I would’ve picked a better, more interesting album to write my first review since early August on, but whatever. What are you gonna do? Bitch about it? Maybe I’m just bitter because the Sox are down 17-8 right now and have about as much chance of winning the ALCS as the Detroit Tigers, but this album is distinctly…just sorta OK! Definitely Cream’s weakest. As songwriters, Cream were never really top of the heap, but they had their fun, novelty-ish psychedelic qualities that I tend to enjoy and make them a little more interesting than they probably should be, and at least they could jam pretty damn well. But what happens when you take out the fun psychelic weirdness AND the instrumental freakouts? Mediocrity!
And half-covers! Basically, only one Cream album isn’t a hodgepodge, so it’s not like you’re going into one of their records looking for a fully-unified artistic statement and masterpiece, but I would like them to do better than one really cool lead-off track with pleasing vocal harmonies up the wazoo, a bunch of hit-or-miss ditties that at times sound like idiotic Sesame Street children’s singalong crap, a bunch of random blues covers that run the gamut between ass-kicking and fuck-all annoying, and a drum solo so horrendous it makes “Moby Dick” sound like “Stairway to Heaven.” And I know that was a long sentence, but that’s all we have here! So I believe I have a right to be annoyed. I mean, yes, “I Feel Free” is pretty great. Eric’s (I believe?) “ba, ba, ba, ba ba ba I feel free!” contrasting with Jack’s (I believe?) “mmmmmm!!” tasty harmony poo is indeed tanfastic, and the rest of the song is, well, solid if unspectactular when compared to Cream’s later triumphs. However, it’s easily the best original here, and therefore I have problems.
Sometimes it feels like the band wrote the melodies and lyrics to the remaining four originals that aren’t fucking “Toad” in about 30 minutes after watching a rerun of Captain Kangaroo. “N.S.U.” starts out OK, even though Jack’s rhymes are sort of dumb, and I even like the “AHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” way too loud things that Jack does, but it doesn’t feel like the song goes anywhere. “Sleepy Time Time” is a dirty blues workout that loses 110% of its dirtiness by being titled “Sleepy Time Time” and repeating the title repeatedly in its chorus. “Dreaming” is kind of sappy and dumb for a Cream rocker, but it’s inoffensive, and “Sweet Wine” actually finishes off the original section on a decent note. Probably the best instrumental workout of the originals side is contained herein during the song’s second half, but even that is dwarfed by some of the stuff in the 2nd half. The band sounds almost tame when they’re running through “Dreaming” and “Sleepy Time Time” and shit, and I sit here and think “THESE guys ‘planted the seeds’ for heavy metal? Fneh?” The only truly memorable part of this record’s first half is the vocal harmony intro to “I Feel Free,” and the rest ranges from decently good down to decently stupid.
The covers section has a bigger range, though, on both ends. First off, their rendition of Willie Dixon’s “Spoonful” is AWESOME. The first taste of the disjointed-yet-interesting “Cream jams” that split the music-buying public right smack down the middle, they work the motherfucker out to 6 and a half solid, grooving minutes, and Jack even uses his Distorted Bass From Hell for the first time! Brad approves. Brad also approves the speedy harmonica-laden fun of Muddy Waters’ “Rollin’ and Tumblin’,” which he sometimes thinks is his favorite track here, but the rest of the covers he is either ambivalent towards or wishes would go away. “Four Until Late” is nice but forgettable, “Cat’s Squirrel” has like 2 lines of lyrics and is horrendous, and “I’m So Glad,” although taken out to extended lengths for patented Cream insano-jams at later times, here reveals why the band chooses to jump past its intro so quickly on said insano-jams. “I’m so glad, I’m so glad, I’m glad, I’m glad, I’m glad!” are the only lyrics, and they’re repeated about 50 times. When I referred earlier to “stupid moronic childrens’ shit” or some such thing, this is what I was talking about. Blech.
And then there’s “Toad.” Now, to be fair, the main riff of the song, pre-drum solo, is actually quite good, and I like how there’s a bit of a call-and-response section before the actual drum solo, and the song doesn’t just dive in there like everyone’s token drunk uncle, but the drum solo itself is just about excruciating. And I’m giving negative bonus points here for being the first, the springboard to your “Moby Dick” and your “Rat Salad” and every other time a boring drum solo takes a shit in the middle of a very good album. But Led Zeppelin II and Paranoid are both like 100 times better than this record, and “Moby Dick” and “Rat Salad” are just boring. “Toad,” however, is AWFUL.
Pretty underwhelming, this one is. You can see the instrumental prowess, and “I Feel Free,” “Spoonful,” and “Rollin’ and Tumblin’” are worth the price of admission sometimes, but there’s nothing else here worth more than a cursory look, by my count, though only “Toad” is repulsive. So much is just kinda stupid and kinda useless. And, as I said in the beginning, my favorite things about Cream (the psychedelic goofiness and the insano-jams) are simply not here (except for the instrumental tastiness of “Spoonful,” that is). Except for “Toad,” it’s a perfectly OK listen, I guess, but that’s about as much enthusiasm as I can muster. Clearly, the band needed more time to ripen.
Disraeli Gears (1967)
Rating: 8
Best Song: “Sunshine
Of Your Love”
Much better, though not the psychedelic heavy metal masterpiece some Russian linguists make it out to be. What Cream has done here is learned to write fully-developed songs, instead of just tossing a few stupid lines about “Sleepy time time” onto a half-assed blues workout. There’s a reason the casual fan has heard of exactly ZERO songs on Fresh Cream, and yet this one has between one and four radio staples, depending on what your local classic rock radio station’s personal playlist is. “Sunshine of Your Love” is the one everyone’s dog heard that one time after it buried the remote in your backyard, but it does deserve the airplay, sho’ nuff. Jack Bruce is using his Distorted Bass From Hell is actual song context instead of jam context, and it’s excellent stuff! Plus, the band’s getting “all psychedelic and shit!” Look at the album cover, dammit! Sometimes the acid leads them off a cliff, sure, but when used properly it can make one helluva whopper of a damn song. Like “Sunshine of Your Love,” for instance. That’s a pretty good song.
Other good songs abound, as well. Good, focused, fully-developed songs. This is the only album Cream ever made that even approaches cohesive. 10 3-4 minute psychedelic-pop-blues-rock ditties that aren’t necessarily all top-notch, but they all at least make sense, which is more than can be said for some of their tracks later on. “Strange Brew” is your leadoff track, and though it doesn’t start the album off with a BANG(!) like maybe you want it to, it’s a nice subtle little ditty. “World of Pain” and “Dance the Night Away” are winners, too, even though their titles makes them sound like, respectively, a novelty hit rap song from 1997 and an extended disco remix of something produced by Nile Rodgers of Chic. The remaining song on the first side, however, proves that, between “Toad” and some of his other leanings, Eric and Jack should pretty much keep Ginger far, far away from songwriting duties. “Blue Condition” sounds like someone whacked out on acid in the “doobly novelty crap tune that sucks but this retard thinks is hilarious” way instead of the “brain opened up to reveal new ways of thinking about music” way, and there’s also the fact that Ginger, when he sings, sounds like some random dude from Millwall or something, and not, you know, AN ACTUAL SINGER. Not a very good song.
Side 2 can’t match side 1 (no “Sunshine” here!), but it’s still fine. “Tales of Brave Ulysses” might be my second-favorite song on the album, completely idiotic lyrics and everything. “Tiny purple fishes run laughing through your fingers!” Yes, um…sure. In any case, it’s an incredibly strong, focused, developed, tightly-crafted song, the kind that, along with the entire first side outside of “Blue Condition,” you don’t normally see in very high concentration on a Cream album. “Swlabr,” lyrically, makes about as much sense as its title, but I’m not one to judge British people in 1967 for writing lyrics that were inspired by a particularly bad trip. It was simply par for the course. Another winner of song, too! A bit faster-paced than the laid back “Strange Brew,” hard-rocking “Sunshine,” and almost meditatively weird “Tales,” but still nearly as strong. I especially love the “Such good responses!” line. The side dies a little after that, but the remaining tunes are all at least acceptable, unlike “Blue Condition.” “We’re Going Wrong” is a bit sluggish, but alright, and “Outside Woman Blues” and “Take it Back” are a bit repetitive, but nice in their own ways. Acceptable! They’d be relative highlights on the originals section of Fresh Cream, at least, and here they’re buried at the end of side 2, so that tells you something about the relative merits of the two records’ songwriting, eh?
Although I keep mentioning this record’s “ten tracks,” there is an 11th, “Mother’s Lament,” which sounds like nothing other than a 90-second Monty Python sketch (Oooo! Overtly cockney accents are funny!), but it’s like a joke epilogue about someone’s baby falling down a shower drain and dying (which, ofcourse, is hilarious!), so I don’t even usually count it as part of the album. Never euthanized anyone’s ferret, in any case. It’s kinda funny. Also better than “Blue Condition” (man, that song just grinds the record to a halt, being between “Dance the Night Away” and “Tales of Brave Ulysses” and all). Forget it! Doesn’t count! Not a fully realized, fully developed song! So it doesn’t fit. Because that’s what you find on this record. Tightly focused blues-rock songs with very overt psychedelic leanings and good pop sensibility. Not all of them hit as hard as the best few, and one most definitely misses, but still a sizeable improvement over the debut. And those of you who like this new, laser-focused Cream…sorry.
Wheels Of Fire (1968)
Rating: 8
Best Song:
“Crossroads”
Big and weird and messy is definitely not what many a Cream fan was hoping for after the quality of Israeli Occupation, but that’s what they got. Half-live, half-studio, all messy, Wheels are Starting to Come Off, while not the first album you’d run to if you like the idea of Cream as songwriters, probably is your best bet for Cream as musicians. Disraeli had some nicely constructed songs, but seemed a little thin and, um, neutered? Not “Sunshine of Your Love,” no sir, but some of the other tunes…sure, yeah. Neutered is probably a good word (or not…like I give a fuck). Or maybe I’ll just stick with “thin.” Not “thick” or “layered,” in any case. And nothing that made you jump up and go “man, them thar Cream guys are sure good musicians!” This one’s better in that regard. The studio half shows more variety, adventurousness, and sophisticated production than Disraeli ever did, and parts of the live half are absolutely superb. However, parts of both completely suck donkey dong. So you gotta take what you can get.
I’ll go studio half first, then live half, because that way I can save my anti-“Toad” rant for the end like in my Fresh Cream review, and who doesn’t like a nice pattern? Anyway, a handful of the studio tracks are among my personal Cream favorites, and “White Room” probably is my personal Cream favorite. Great *BOOM!!* type leadoff track, unlike the subtle goodness of “Strange Brew.” Just grabs you right off the bat. And top-notch drumming from Ginger. Some of his fills in this tune are brilliant. He really is a great drummer. It’s just sometimes blinded by the fact that “Toad” is fucknuts terrible.
We’ve got some quality generic blues-y tasty rock and rolls with jam on the studio half, too, specifically the groovy “Sitting on Top of the World” (great drumming! Great Eric soloing!) and the sleazy “Politician,” which really should have been the Clinton/Gore campaign theme song in 1992 instead of “Don’t Stop Thinking About Tomorrow.” Not that I dislike Fleetwood Mac or anything, but let’s be honest here…Bubba showed many people his “politics” in the “back” of his “big black car,” if you “poll my group of 600 likely voters,” and I think you do. No matter! Good song. My other favorites among the studio tracks are the cool, laid-back, cello-filled “As You Said,” and the relaxed throwaway closer (to the studio half) “Anyone for Tennis,” which just glides psychedelically (is that a word?) by on acoustic guitars and bongos. Along with “As You Said,” I think that Cream shows on the studio half that they, at times, were quite capable of producing interesting, non-blues-rock, airy psychedelic platters if they wanted, even if sometimes they turned out like “Passing the Time,” which is boring and just about totally useless, and “Pressed Rat and Warthog,” which is actually very cool but makes no fucking sense whatsoever. Spoken word? Huh? What’s a Pressed Rat? What’s “Amplified Heat?” What the fuck are you talking about? At least the rest of the studio half is normal, if not spectacular. Forming the meat between “Politician” and “Anyone for Tennis” in the pastrami sandwich on side 2, the remaining three tunes are relatively standard blues-rock Creamsongs, and I like them fine, but don’t remember too much about them afterwards (and I’ve listened to this record a LOT, since I spent September and half of October with no Internet access at my place of residence and just listened to these damn Cream albums every day in preparation for when I’d actually be able to update this site again), but they have cool titles! Especially “Deserted Cities of the Heart.” Whatever the fuck that means.
Live half! Now, I know you’re still getting over my declaration in the intro that I like Cream jams, but bear with me! I know the three guys don’t really work “together,” and, yes, that would be nice to hear once in a while, but they’re all such great musicians! Jack Bruce particularly shines on the live Cream material I’ve been able to hear (which, admittedly, isn’t much, because I have about as much intention of buying any Live Cream compilations as the RNC has of not committing massive voter fraud this November 2nd). So they go a little far sometimes, yes. I know. But I’m still buying “Crossroads” hook, line, and sinker, because it’s only four minutes long and provides twice as much pure, ass-kicking power as any other Creamtrack I know of. Jack and Eric are both soloing like madmen in the middle sections, and the main riff’s guitar tone is delicious. Fantastic stuff. Definitely my favorite Creamtrack. I also like “Traintime” a lot, too, even if it is a little repetitive and similar to “Rollin’ and Tumblin’” from Fresh Cream, and I’m gonna give the extended workout of “Spoonful” a thumbs-up as well, even if the boys could probably be served to cut some off its 16-minute running time. Like, oh, half of it would be nice. But it’s still OK. Not “Toad,” though. Sixteen damn minutes of it. Hear me? SIXTEEN. MINUTES. OF “TOAD.” Shoot me in the head right now, please. Just put me out of my misery. And that’s all I have to say about that.
This record is the best display you can have of all of Cream’s sides. The occasionally perfect songwriters (“White Room”). The competent-to-excellent blues-rock craftsmen (“Sitting on Top” and “Politician” vs. the stuff on side 2). The psychedelic drug-inhalers (the rest of the studio record). The proto-metal ass-kicking pioneers (“Crossroads,” maybe “Traintime”). The long-winded wankfest progenitors (“Spoonful”). That fucking band that wrote “Toad” (“Toad”). It’s all here. The best moments are better than anything on Disraeli. The worst moment is soul-crushingly useless and awful. In short, a total mess, but an interesting one. And if you cut off “Toad,” half of “Spoonful,” and the weaker chunks of the studio record, you could have a 45-minute half-and-half slab of brilliance I might give a 10. But Ginger Baker just had to solo for sixteen fucking minutes, because he’s Ginger Baker and that’s what he does.
Goodbye (1969)
Rating: 7
Best Song: “Doing
That Scrapyard Thing”
Total. Fucking. Cash-in. Did Cream break up before this even came out? I’ve heard something to that effect. Would that surprise me? Fuck no! This theoretically non-live album has a grand total of TEN GODDAMN MINUTES of new studio material on it! Ten! Three fucking songs. And one of them’s not even any good! A pox on this. The remaining 20-odd minutes is, ofcourse, taken up by some more stereotypical Cream live material, this time run-throughs of “I’m So Glad,” “Politician,” and “Sitting on Top of the World.” I’ve also yet to see a review of this record longer than like 100 words, and I will be no different, because what the hell do you say about it? The three live tracks, except for their intros and conclusions, sound more or less the same. Now, remember, I LIKE the live tracks fine, and Jack Bruce’s ultra-loud Distorted Bass from Hell drives the motherfuckers along at a nice pace, but it’s not like I’m gonna cream (Ha! Pun!) my pants over this stuff. It’s just Cream live. It’s pretty cool. A lot of it sounds strikingly similar, but it’s pretty cool.
The studio tracks also aren’t bad, even though they sound like they were tossed off in 2 minutes a piece. “Badge” is a nice little pop song, and “Doing That Scrapyard Thing” is actually very cute, entertaining and (to this man’s ears) underrated, but “What a Bringdown” doesn’t have all that much reason to exist. Not surprisingly, Ginger wrote it.
And how do
I write more than this on such an album?
I’ve already described what Live Cream sounds like in the intro, they
don’t break out any new songs live, and the studio songs are nice but
unremarkable. No “White Room” or
“Sunshine of Your Love” here, sir. This
record is just so INESSENTIAL!!!! But
it’s entertaining if you like Live Cream, as I do, so slap a 7 on it and call
it my daddy (just like the Yankees now must call the Red Sox their daddy. HA!!!!!!!!!!!! Didn’t think you were gonna get an entire
review page without an extended reference to that series, did you? Ofcourse not!
Hee!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And the best
part is how I live in
End of rant. End of review. End of Cream’s career. End of Yankees’ aura of invincibility. Now you dipshits know how it feels to be a Red Sox fan. Eat it and like it.