EAST COAST, USA

September 1967

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Leaving for USA, Heathrow Airport, London, 18th August
Note Janet with Jack, Eric with Charlotte and no Liz Baker (at home caring for the kids!)

When they had arrived in San Francisco, Cream had been touring heavily for over a year. They were jaded and also chagrined about Jimi Hendrix’s success in their homeland. If this tour had not been a success they may have broken up.

The response of the audiences in San Francisco drew forth a new performance approach. They had always improvised within the song forms as they never ‘memorised’ solos, like most lesser musicians. Here, the audiences demands for them to "just play" resulted in the instrumental breaks becoming increasingly extended with the songs just the start and end of the real meat – the jamming.

After their triumphant debut on the West Coast, they went to the more conservative East Coast. They mainly played in Boston and New York.

Psychedelic Supermarket, Boston Massachusets

2 sets each night, 10th-16th September 1967

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Boston was a very conservative city not taken to "hippies" resulting in them mainly staying in their hotel. The performance, perhaps, shows the impact of that atmosphere. While the playing is undeniably excellent, it is more restrained compared to Brandeis. This may have also been due to doing two shows each night. This recording sounds like it is from the first show of one of the nights.

Psychedelic Supermarket was recorded on a typical domestic recorder in mono. It was positioned left of stage giving dominance to the bass. Lead guitar and vocals are distant. It’s especially attractive to the Jack Bruce fans. Frequency range is limited and tape noise is high. It was tightly recorded onto a 30min tape, so there are tape start ups effecting each song.

PS – I’d appreciate any info on the Psychedelic Supermarket venue and here is some at last.

jbbass.JPG (10921 bytes) Tales of Brave Ulysses (4.20)

Preceded by Jack and Ginger mucking around. Solid version with Eric using less wah-wah then usual on the coda.

Sunshine of Your Love (7.10)

A tight version with a quite intense final coda. Still, a better performance than the official release.

Spoonful (11.42)

A comparatively brief version with the vocal sections being fairly extended. Pretty similar to the early ’67 performances. Doesn’t hit a high plain but still shows they were still good even when not at their best. It is interesting to note the jam reference points that are common to all versions.

Sweet Wine (8.00) – Incomplete

Unfortunately the best performance is cut short by the tape running out. Baker and Clapton were, in particular, locking.  They were really hiting their straps and …

8th August 1998

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© 2002  by Graeme Pattingale