three with EC

["BING E BONG"]

[rayge]

Oh thank fuck for that - I feared this might be abouit Elvis Costello.
I actually own all three of these in one form or another, and it's a pity I have but one vote to give. To do that, I'm going to have to refresh my memory of Hideaway - it's been a very long time - and people are sleeping, so maybe over the weekend.
No Yardbirds, tho?

["BING E BONG"]

It was either them or the Bluesbreakers. But I don't know of any really GREAT Yardbirds songs he played on. 'For Your Love'?

[riggers]

The Beano album was his peak for me. That Les Paul through a Marshall sound, cranked and with the recording mic placed 20 feet away was revolutionary.
He plays with real fire and inventiveness here. Cream were pretty cool, but he's already trotting out the same repertoire of licks. Luckily, they had some decent material and Jack Bruce's voice.

"Layla" is a pretty nice album, nothing wrong with it, but it's hardly earth shattering.

[loveless]

I don't know it all (Clapton-era Yardbirds), but I've always loved that recording of "I Ain't Got You".

[loveless]

And, yeah, I tend to think of Cream as Bruce's band (Clapton admits as much).

But that solo on "Sunshine..." is pretty bad ass ("Blue Moon" played with that rhythm pickup sound).

[Stacy Heydon]

I don't even like him that much as a guitarist, too smooth and he overplays.

Anyway I voted for 'sunshine'.

[Charlie O.]

Another vote for "Sunshine", but I like/love all three. I would love "Layla" substantially more if the second part were shorter and didn't feature Duane's out-of-tune slide meanderings (I'm surprised Tom Dowd wasn't as irritated by them as I am).

[fonz]

Not keen.
Sunshine is ok

[toomanyhatz]

Voting for the heroin album here. Might be a bit sick of the title track, but I still am moved by it every time. And I'm certainly no less tired of "Sunshine," as great as it is.

The Bluesbreakers are great, don't get me wrong, but being raised with their importance being a given has soured me a bit on them. The actual music isn't THAT different from what a lot of folks were doing at the time, and Mayall himself has always felt more 'right place right time' than anybody that had any inherent genius himself.

As I've always said, overplayed or no - and I could certainly make a stronger single disc out of the Layla album - the 'real' Eric has always felt far more in evidence there than anywhere else.

[Charlie O.]

Oh, the Layla album is fabulous.

[fange]

Nobody is gonna beat the original of 'Hideaway', but it i love all three tracks here. Sometimes its all about the feel, and Clapton had it.