They only existed for little more than a year but they had a profound impact with their two albums. Of course, Dave Mason was initially supposed to be in Derek and the Dominos (spelled wrongly) but left after one gig.
Their Layla album was one of the first that I bought new and used to handle it like a precious artefact. I loved all pre 461 Ocean Boulevard Eric Clapton music from the Yardbirds onwards. Not so much afterwards.
The best songs on it are lesser known like Thorn Tree In The Garden, Anyday, Have You Ever Loved a Woman?, Key To The Highway and others.
The guitar playing is so intense and passionate. Nobody needs to hear Layla anymore but in 1970 it was still amazing.Still in 1975 when I came to it. I think I was just at the stage of having overwhelming unrequited crushes on girls, so the overpoweringly intense passions in the love songs really spoke to me.
They played one tour of America and a few UK dates.
And the following live album recorded at the Fillmore East really played into my love of lead guitar with its extended versions. The shortest track is six and a half minutes. Blues Power/Have You Ever Loved A Woman is 17 and a half.
Given the amount of drugs that were around at the time, it isn’t surprising that it all fell apart when trying to record the second studio album
The incredible thing is it didn't chart in the UK but made #16 in America and the live album made #36 in UK and #20 in the states.
