The Good Stuff - The first side of the Blind Faith album ("Had to Cry Today", "Well Alright", "Presence of the Lord"), several Traffic classics ("Glad", "Pearly Queen" although I really missed the sax on that one) and several other great tunes. "Tough Luck Blues" had some truly amazing guitar work by EC and they did a really spectacular jamming version of "Little Wing".
Then there was the Acoustic part of the show, first with Steve Winwood alone at the organ doing "Georgia", then Eric sitting down with the acoustic guitar and doing "Driftin' ", "Nobody knows When You're Down and Out", "Layla" and Clapton/Winwood together doing a beautiful "Can't Find My Way Home".
Closing out the show, they rocked out on the Crowd Pleasers, "Crossroads", "Voodoo Chile", and "Cocaine". Clapton certainly can wail on the guitar with innovative solos and inspirational runs. Winwood's vocals and Hammond organ playing are also top notch. This show was all about the music, as the only interaction with the audience was a quick "Thankyou" by Clapton after each song and Winwood at one point said "Thanks for coming out, this is fun". I thought it was rather rude that they never bothered to introduce the other band members. The encore was "Dear Mr. Fantasy" another great Traffic song (that we heard the Dead perform last month).
But the concert was put together well, two fine musicians with a great catalog of songs, overall a top notch performance.
A final non-musical note, there was a pyscho woman sitting right in front of us who was talk-talk-talking with her date through the first part of the concert, finally when Winwood was softly singing "Georgia", the Bird leaned down and "shusshed" her. This woman got all ticked off firing invectives and insults back to the Bird, but she finally settled down and watched the rest of the show. Then during the encore when we were all standing and dancing, psycho woman couldn't take it anymore and turned around and started really bitching and insulting the Bird. Even the folks in the row behind us were taken aback and everyone started telling her to shut up. I can't imagine what makes someone act like that especially in such a friendly musical environment. Oh well.
i saw clapton a few years ago at the verizon and quite honestly, was not overly wowed. maybe my expectations for meeting "god" wer too high. i did note to others there that night that ec has nothing on dylan for greeting the crowd! maybe it's a generation thing and back in the day, when these guys were coming up, nobody cared, were too stoned, whatever. i think that ec with winwood did make for a huge + and would have liked that better.
ReplyDeletealso, it is a drag to have a "psycho" in that environment; clearly this show was for HER and you were NOT invited. if there ever was a community, concerts are that and not digging it stinx. where is her blog about the %@#& bird behind her ruining HER show ?! ;-)