Cream: Fresh Cream [POLYDOR]

Why you'll love it

This 180g stereo pressing comes with a download coupon. Rolling Stone ranked Fresh Cream at No. 102 on its 2012 list of the 500 greatest albums of all time.

This edition

• 180g vinyl
• Stereo
• Download card included

About the album

Cream were formed in July 1966 and in a studio within weeks. Jack Bruce, Eric Clapton and Ginger Baker cut the album at Rayrik and Ryemuse studios in London on four-track machines, running each song a few times until it caught fire, with Robert Stigwood producing and John Timperley engineering. Budgets were tiny and overdubs minimal, so what you hear is three musicians playing live in a room, pushing each other harder with every take. It arrived in the UK in December 1966, just five months after the trio first met to rehearse.

The record splits neatly between blues covers and originals. "Spoonful," "Rollin' And Tumblin'," "Four Until Late" and "I'm So Glad" show off Clapton's blues fluency and Bruce's big voice, while Bruce's "N.S.U." and "Dreaming" point toward psychedelic pop. Baker contributes "Sweet Wine," co-written with Janet Godfrey, who also co-wrote "Sleepy Time Time," and "Toad" closes things with one of rock's first extended drum solos.

It lit the fuse for blues rock, jam rock and, eventually, heavy metal. Three players, one tiny budget and a debt the loud end of rock is still paying off with interest.

Also at Kops: more Cream on vinyl · browse Rock

Tracklist

Listen

On Polydor (cat# 535 484-2), a reissue of the 1966 album.