News

UMe will celebrate the 50th anniversary of Derek & The Dominos’ sole album on November 13, by converting a deluxe edition released nearly a decade ago for a first-time vinyl release.

Layla and Other Assorted Love Songs was celebrated back in 2011 with a deluxe, cross-format box set that featured the remastered original album (on CD, vinyl and in a 5.1 surround mix on DVD), 1973’s In Concert, and a disc of 13 bonus tracks, including new mixes of outtakes from the supergroup’s unfinished second album and a live set from The Johnny Cash Show. This new box strips things back somewhat, offering the half-speed mastered album and the 13 bonus cuts across four LPs along with the 12″ x 12″ book from the 40th anniversary set and a certificate of authenticity. Miles Showell at Abbey Road has mastered the original album here. (The 2CD 40th anniversary edition will also go back into print as well, ostensibly for the 50th anniversary.)

Layla was the end result of four members of Delaney & Bonnie Bramlett’s touring group – guitarist Eric Clapton (already well-known for work with Blind Faith, The Beatles and many more), singer Bobby Whitlock, bassist Carl Radle and drummer Jim Gordon – coming together for a brief but fruitful series of sessions. (Their earliest session produced the briefly issued single “Tell the Truth,” produced by Phil Spector and featuring guitar work from Dave Mason and George Harrison.) The Layla sessions also featured scintillating guitar contributions from Duane Allman. Despite the album’s pedigree, the album never performed to expectations, and tragedy followed the group: Allman was killed in a motorcycle crash in 1971, Radle died in 1980 after years of drug abuse, and Gordon remains institutionalized after killing his mother during a schizophrenic episode in 1983.

But gradually, Layla‘s title track took hold as one of Clapton’s crowning achievements: written about his insatiable infatuation with Harrison’s wife Pattie Boyd (who indeed had a decade-long marriage with the guitarist after divorcing the Beatle), “Layla” became a Top 10 hit on both sides of the Atlantic in 1972; in 1990, its Gordon-led piano outro scored a pivotal scene in Martin Scorsese’s Goodfellas – and three years later, a striking acoustic performance for MTV’s Unplugged won a Grammy Award.

You can pre-order the vinyl box and 2CD set below and peruse the track list, unchanged since 2011, below.

Layla and Other Assorted Love Songs: 50th Anniversary Edition (Polydor/UMe, 2020)

4LP: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada
2CD: Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada

LP 1-2/CD 1: Original album (released as Polydor 2625 005 (U.K.)/Atco SD 2-704 (U.S.), 1970)

1. I Looked Away
2. Bell Bottom Blues
3. Keep on Growing
4. Nobody Knows You When You’re Down and Out
5. I Am Yours
6. Anyday
7. Key to the Highway
8. Tell the Truth
9. Why Does Love Got to Be So Sad?
10. Have You Ever Loved a Woman
11. Little Wing
12. It’s Too Late
13. Layla
14. Thorn Tree in the Garden

LP 3-4/CD 2: Bonus material

1. Mean Old World
2. Roll It Over
3. Tell the Truth (Single Version)
4. It’s Too Late (Live on The Johnny Cash Show – 11/5/1970)
5. Got to Get Better in a Little While (Live on The Johnny Cash Show – 11/5/1970)
6. Matchbox (with Johnny Cash & Carl Perkins) (Live on The Johnny Cash Show – 11/5/1970)
7. Blues Power (Live on The Johnny Cash Show – 11/5/1970)
8. Snake Lake Blues (New Mix)
9. Evil (New Mix)
10. Mean Old Frisco (New Mix)
11. One More Chance (New Mix)
12. Got to Get Better in a Little While (Jam)
13. Got to Get Better in a Little While (New Mix)

Track 1 from The Layla Sessions – Polydor 847 083-2, 1990
Tracks 2-3 from Atco single 45-6780 (U.K.), 1970
Tracks 4-7 and 12 from Layla and Other Assorted Love Songs: 40th Anniversary Edition – Polydor/UMe B0015353-02, 2011
Original mixes of Tracks 8-11 and 13 from Crossroads – Polydor 835 261-1, 1988