Gibson.com has posted an interesting article about Eric Clapton, featuring 10 facts you may not have previously known about the legendary guitarist.
Clapton has been widely considered to be among the best guitarists of all time for decades. He has won numerous Grammy awards and has been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame multiple times.
His work with legendary rock bands like the Yardbirds and Cream, as well as his awe inspiring solo efforts, saw Clapton become a major influence of a generation of guitarists, during the ’60s and ’70s. To this day, Clapton remains one of the most talented and respected guitarists to have ever lived.
Almost every aspect of Clapton’s musical and personal life has been well documented over the years. The guitar master himself, gave us the best insight into his life, when he released his book, ‘Clapton: The Auotbiography.’ While much of the below information on Clapton has been known for years, the significance of many of them has perhaps, been over-looked.
You can read a few excerpts from the Gibson article below.
· He’s the only artist who’s been inducted in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame three times.
In 1992, Clapton received his first induction into the Rock and Hall of Fame, for his membership in the The Yardbirds. A year later, he was again inducted for his role in the legendary power trio, Cream. Finally, in 2000, he was inducted as a solo artist in the very first year in which he was eligible.
· He loved George Harrison, but he thought Beatlemania was “despicable.”
“It showed how sheep-like people were, and how ready they were ready to elevate players to the status of gods,” he wrote, in his autobiography. “Most of the artists I admired had died unheard of, sometimes penniless and alone.” Of course, Clapton himself would be dubbed a “god.”
· Of all the bands he’s been in, the one he wishes had lasted longer was… Blind Faith.
“I think Blind Faith was over too soon,” he told MSNBC, in 2007. “We could have gone on maybe a couple more years. But I’m not really a band member. I think all [the other] bands probably lasted about the right amount of time for what they were meant to do.”
· The one instance in which he believed he might retire from music was… when he left The Yardbirds.
“The Yardbirds were determined to have a hit and I was determined not to be involved with that,” Clapton told Larry King, in 1998. “I actually thought I was going to retire. I was 18 years old, and I thought, it’s over. Every band I looked at had the same agenda: Let’s get a hit record and recording contract. And I kind of went, and then what? For me, the road was about a different thing altogether.”
· His first “really serious” guitar was a Gibson ES-335.
At the turn of 1965, while he was in The Yardbirds, Clapton bought a cherry red ES-335, which he called “the instrument of [his] dreams.” He elaborated, in his 2007 autobiography: “It was the first of a new era of guitars, which were thin and semi-acoustic,” he wrote. “[The ES-335] was both a ‘rock guitar’ and a ‘blues guitar,’ which you could play, if necessary, without amplification and still hear it.”