- Audio CD (9 Mar 1998)
- Number of Discs: 1
- Format: Original recording reissued, Original recording remastered
- Label: Commercial Marketing
- ASIN: B0000067L1
- Other Editions: Audio CD | Audio Cassette | Vinyl | MP3 Download
- Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 27,264 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)
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Product details |
Track Listings
| 1. I Feel Free |
| 2. N.S.U. |
| 3. Sleepy Time Time |
| 4. Dreaming |
| 5. Sweet Wine |
| 6. Spoonful |
Product Description
Review
Laid down at the height of the UK blues boom, Fresh Cream covers the kind of territory you might expect from three of the most respected players on the scene at the time. With Clapton fresh just from his time with John Mayall, Ginger Baker leaving behind the R'n'B backwaters of Graham Bond Organisation, and a woefully under-employed Jack Bruce hightailing it from the increasingly pop-leaning Manfred Mann, the electric blues was their natural turf.
Highlights include the racing harmonica work-out, and the call and response excitements on Muddy Waters’ “Rollin’ and Tumblin,’” a spine-tingled vocal on the Willie Dixon classic, “Spoonful” as well as the self-penned “Sleepy Time Time” which gives Clapton a free hand to wake up all and sundry. The traditional standard, "Cat’s Squirrel" is given a rousing treatment, showing how well these players meshed. Only a particularly anaemic stroll through Robert Johnson’s “Four Until Late”, sounds like a side filler.
What lifts this album beyond the blues-tinged pigeon-hole are some superior pop songs brought along for the ride.
It’s well-neigh impossible to hear the opening bars of “I Feel Free” without conjuring up images of dolly birds, hip young guys in new threads full of finger-clicking coolness hopping aboard one of those brand new Mini cars and soaring off for groovy times. Cultural cliché’s aside, given the amount of musical information that’s been packed into those two minutes and fifty-five seconds, it’s a wonder the thing doesn’t implode under the weight of its own inventiveness.
The rhythmic ambitions and ambiguity of “NSU” adds to the thrill, and if some of it doesn’t quite work as well as it should (Bruce’s dreary “Dreaming” is especially lame), “Sweet Wine” with its psyche-tinged lyrics and the heavy breakout offers a clear hint of what was to come. Overshadowed by its more famous successor (1967’s Disraeli Gears) and their reputation lengthy improvisations during which mighty civilisations would rise and fall, their debut captures one of those elusive moments in music when blues, pop and rock magically starts to coalesce to create something brand new. --Sid Smith
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
A fine album with half the tracks ruined by primitive stereo engineering,
By Basiledes (N. Wales) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Fresh Cream (Audio CD)
Nearly all the numbers on this 1967 first album suffer from extremely unnatural and artificial sounding stereo separation and the artificial production. This is particularly damaging in the case of 'NSU', 'Sweet Wine' and 'I'm So Glad'. The bass and drums are placed on the extreme right on top of one another so that it is often difficult to tell the bass and bass drum apart. Vocals and guitar tend to be on the left and extreme left. This is the sort of stereo engineering one associates with the early 60s. They both sound much better when heard in mono but nothing can save the vocals of 'I'm So Glad' from the production. Later they solved the problem of 'Glad' by using two voices instead of the over-exposed and forward-sounding voice of Bruce on his own. Strangely, the drums are more centrally placed in the stereo mix on this track and if only they had used the two voices and recessed them a bit in the mix it would have sounded quite convincing.
'Spoonful' also sounds too artificially produced for a blues number but the other blues tracks fare less badly as the production is more basic. Although I have only given this 3 stars that is intended as a measure of how far short it is of what it might have been. But played in mono, or if it were re-engineered with a more convincing sound stage, I would give it 4 against the 5 of 'Goodbye Cream'. I would not recommend this as a place to find some impressive guitar playing from Clapton. His playing here is simplified and submerged under the attempts of the producer to create something psychedelic - this was 1966. More impressive playing is to be found on Clapton's earlier work with John Mayall but unfortunately it is rhythmically just conventional blues. What has not been sufficiently understood is how different Cream were because of their different use of rhythm, partly arising from the material, partly from the drummer, and partly from the contrapuntal bass. But on this first album the clue to the new rhythmic approach comes mainly from the new material.
18 of 21 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Seminal.,
By Mr. Colin Rankin "Colin Rankin" (Braintree, essex United Kingdom) - See all my reviews (VINE VOICE) (REAL NAME)
This review is from: Fresh Cream (Audio CD)
Two rock albums in my younger days typified to me great rock music......one was the first Led Zeppelin album.....the other was this...which pre-dated Zeppelin by about 3 years.When I first heard this my mind and musical tastes went into overdrive.Until this album I was totally focused on the Beatles and loved them!!!Fresh Cream showed me something else; but it wasn't until Clapton's extraordinary 'Tales Of Brave Ulysses'on Creams next album,'Disraeli Gears' that I really understood the revolution that was going on in music.Fortunately or unfortunately the Beatles have dominated and have set a superb standard.However,there were many other great bands whose influence has waned as a result.Any new band picking up on this will make a HUGE killing!....This album is a great starting point!
4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Brilliant, timeless debut...,
By
This review is from: Fresh Cream (Audio CD)
When you set out to be "the best", as Cream did, you'd better be sure you deliver. And, after a very odd start with their first single "Wrapping Paper" - that left those who hadn't seen them live wondering what all the fuss was about - deliver they did with an album that remains one of the most inventive and powerful debuts of all time. Still exciting forty years on (and helped by the inclusion of "I Feel Free" which inexplicably was only released as a single in the UK despite being recorded in the same sessions) its combination of driving blues and Eric Clapton's incredible "barrier bending" guitar playing - evidenced to perfection in their stunning interpretation of Skip James' "I'm So Glad" - took the British R&B scene by storm and set a precedent that raised expectations of what was to come beyond all reasonable levels.
There was indeed more to come, but while much of "Disraeli Gears" and parts of "Wheels of Fire" were as good, if not better, "Fresh Cream" is infused with the sheer enthusiasm of a group getting it right for the first time. And, like all similarly brilliant debut albums, that's what shines through and makes it timeless.
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