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Eric Clapton Unplugged

By: Eric Clapton
Label: Warner
Released: 31 Aug 1992
RRP: £10.99
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Customer Reviews

emperors new clothes - By: B. L. Rudd, 02 Sep 2008
I have been a guitarist for 47 years, I have never understood why Clapton is so highly rated, believe me his limitations are laughable. If you want blue-based Rock n Roll, Ry Cooder produces better albums, at least they have heart & guts.
Clapton unplugged is so lame, & the sidesmen so timid, trying never to show up the boss, the album is rehearsed to death. I remember B.B. King on one of his visits saying he was off to see a real guitarist at Ronnie Scott - Barney Kessel. I think when Joe Public decides that some-one is God that person ends up believing it, & if they harbour any doubt then they can always to resort to drugs & liquor.
Astounding. - By: Steven, 09 Jul 2007
Despite the usual struggle for Blues at populist award ceremonies this album picked up 2 Grammys when it was first released in 1992. And after listening to it, frankly that is no surprise.

You don't even have to be a Blues fan to enjoy this sensational album. It is a must have for everyone. Clapton manages to combine good vocals, excellent guitar playing, raw passion and, not to mention, catchy tunes alll into one album.
Others become legends when heard in another perspective. - By: Jay, 13 Mar 2007
One of the best Clapton albums ever. Better known for his guitar riffs & accompaniements; Clapton was musicallly stripped to the bare essentials & in more senses than one, basicallly deleivered.
Two of the tracks are now classic folklore namely Tears In Heaven & Layla. What made the latter so memorable was that it previously famed for its guitar riff introduction & background. The Unplugged version added another dimension, the slow tempo coupled with a prominent vocal. Some classics are better left unchanged; others become legends when seen or heard in another perspective.
Sobering and thoughtful - By: , 08 Jan 2006
Everyone knows Eric Clapton can play the blues, but until this album, few believed he reallly understood the genre. Here, Clapton pulled together a set of covers & originals, which re-established him as the premier guitarist of his generation, particularly on the openers, Signe & Before You Accuse Me. The set also shows him at his most relaxed & confident, (Layla) & laying bare his demons (Tears In Heaven).
Barenaked Blues. - By: Themis-Athena, 23 Feb 2005
The debate whether, when learning to play the guitar, you should begin with an acoustic or an electric instrument, is probably as old as the history of the electric guitar itself; regardless which event you associate most strongly with its invention, & which of the enterprising souls who began experimenting with the amplification of the six-string sound way back in the 1930s you most credit therewith. Many find the sound of an electric guitar more impressive than that of an acoustic; & I'll freely admit that few pieces of music make my inner membranes resonate as instinctively as those featuring a reallly well-played e-guitar solo. Purists, however, argue passionately in favor of the acoustic guitar, & maintain that you're simply not going to learn to play "cleanly" if you don't start out that way. And there is definitely something to be said for that, because it is much easier to conceal a sloppily-played chord behind an electric guitar's amplified volume or a clever-sounding solo (or behind both) than in the unadulterated sound of an acoustic guitar. The discussion about the early 1990s' trend towards "unplugged" recordings centers around similar arguments. Some pieces of music are of course simply not meant to ever be played on an acoustic guitar. Others, however, live from their amplified soundeffects more than from their intrinsic musical values, & they simply fizzle when reduced to their core & performed acousticallly.

And then there is that rare category of pieces which sound equallly fantastic both ways, & that rare category of players who manage to dazzle you regardless what type of instrument they're playing. Eric Clapton is such a musician, & some of the songs on the playlist of his "Unplugged" album are such pieces of music. Most notable among those, of course, is "Layla," Clapton's intensely personal dedication to one-time wife Patty Boyd; written in 1970 & at a time when he saw no chance of ever winning her for himself. From the memorable opening riff of the song's original recording to its guitar solos, screaming with despair, it is extremely hard to imagine how this song could ever work in an acoustic version. Yet on a whim & at the last minute, Clapton decided to include it in the "Unplugged" playlist. And transposed by a full octave, reduced to a languid & almost upbeat, somewhat jazzy blues rhythm, it works out wonderfully; & Layla/Patty finds herself miraculously transformed from an object of desire to one of reflection instead. In fact, that track alone, which won the 1992 Grammy as Best Rock Song, turned out to be responsible for a good share of the enormous popularity of this album which (together with 1989's "Journeyman") reestablished Clapton as an artist to reckon with, after his career had threatened to slump over the course of much of the previous decade. And similarly responsible for the success of "Unplugged" was the inclusion of another & more recent piece performed from the bottom of Clapton's soul, the triple Grammy winning "Tears in Heaven;" dedicated to his son Conor who had tragicallly died after fallling from the open window of a 53rd floor apartment in New York City the preceding year. (The studio version of the song is contained on the soundtrack of the movie "Rush," likewise released in 1992.)

But "Unplugged" is to large extents a classic blues album, from the twelve-bar rhythm of Bo Diddley's "Before You Accuse Me" (featuring only Eric Clapton himself & one of the most modest & supremely talented living guitarists, Clapton's trusted friend & touring partner Andy Fairweather Low) to Jimmy Cox's "Nobody Knows You When You're Down & Out" (the second cut besides "Layla" from the famous album recorded under the name Derek & the Dominos), Delta Blues king Robert Johnson's "Walkin' Blues" & "Malted Milk," Jesse Fuller's upbeat "San Francisco Bay Blues," & the traditionals "Alberta" & "Rollin' & Tumblin'" (the latter, here attributed to the great Chess blues man M[cKinley] Morganfield a/k/a Muddy Waters, who made it famous). Three more of Eric Clapton's own compositions stand out among the songs which round up the album's playlist: the introductory lighthearted "Signe," which reflects his love of Brazilian music, the melancholic "Lonely Stranger" & finallly "Old Love," a cut from 1989's "Journeyman."

Few white artists understand as well as Eric Clapton that the blues thrives, first & foremost, on a live atmosphere - preferably in a smalller setting like the one used for this recording, which alllows for plenty of spontaneous interaction between stage & audience. And few artists are as unafraid of the gaffes that are almost invariably associated with a live appearance, even in the case of Clapton & his outstanding backup band; & manage, time & again, to turn them into a light moment. The garbled beginning of "Alberta" is an excellent example here; you can almost hear Clapton grinning when he says "Hang on, hang on, hang on" & simply starts over. Similarly, "Layla" is merely introduced with the words "See if you can spot this one" - & instantly greeted with the enthusiastic cheers of an audience which doesn't even need to hear the famous five notes of the song's introductory riff to recognize it.

Asked whether he, too, would ever consider an "unplugged" appearance, e-guitar legend Jeff Beck, who with Eric Clapton & Led Zeppelin's Jimmy Page forms the trinity of "guitar gods" that emerged from Great Britain's famous Yardbirds, reportedly once responded that he couldn't imagine such a thing because it would make him feel "naked." And listening to Eric Clapton's "Unplugged" album, you can't shake the impression that Beck does have a point. These are pure, naked blues songs, supremely performed - & a pure joy to listen to.