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A forthcoming vinyl box set will chronicle the highs and lows of Eric Clapton's solo career in the '80s and '90s, from pop-adjacent player to triumphant elder statesman.
Rhino's The Complete Reprise Studio Albums Volume 1 will include six of Slowhand's LPs issued between 1983 and 1998 - from Money and Cigarettes to Pilgrim - as well as an eight-track selection of non-LP live tracks and B-sides that includes two unreleased songs. Nearly every album (save Money and Cigarettes) has been pressed on two LPs - each comprising three sides of vinyl - and all feature new mastering from Bob Ludwig at Gateway Mastering and new lacquers cut by Chris Bellman at Bernie Grundman Mastering.
Clapton's move to Warner Bros. Records and later Reprise (complete with his own vanity label, Duck Records) immediately followed one of the lowest points of his life: a stint in rehab after a longtime battle with alcoholism. Money and Cigarettes, a collaboration with longtime producer Tom Dowd, featured a new band of session players including Ry Cooder and Donald "Duck" Dunn, but even U.S. Top 20 single "I've Got a Rock and Roll Heart" wasn't enough to put Clapton back toward the top of the pack. What followed was a surprising series of overtures toward mainstream pop radio: Behind the Sun (1985) and August (1986) were primarily produced by Phil Collins, with handfuls of session players at the ready and even folks coming in to write songs. The Jerry Lynn Williams-penned "Forever Man" and the Clapton-Robbie Robertson team-up "It's in the Way That You Use It" both topped Billboard's rock singles charts, and "Behind the Mask" - a Yellow Magic Orchestra song with lyrics written by Michael Jackson that was demoed around the Thriller era - made it to the U.K. Top 20. (Oddly, the album's CD bonus cut, "Grand Illusion," is not included despite there being room on the vinyl.)
A year after another trip to rehab, Clapton redefined his work thanks to one of the defining early CD box sets: Crossroads, covering all his solo work as well as the many bands he played in, from The Yardbirds and Cream to Blind Faith and Derek & The Dominos. His legacy established, 1989's Journeyman marked a deeper pivot toward the blues that made his name and spun off two Billboard rock chart-toppers: "Pretending" and "Bad Love." In the five years between Journeyman and next studio effort From the Cradle (1994), much would happen: the tragic death of Clapton's young son Conor, the Grammy-winning hit single that addressed his grief ("Tears in Heaven"), and the blockbuster MTV Unplugged, the bestselling live album ever. From the Cradle marked an excursion fully into the blues, with faithful recreations of classics by Muddy Waters, Otis Rush, Freddie King and others.
There was one more stop in pop territory covered in this box: 1998's Pilgrim, featuring the radio hit "My Father's Eyes" (originally played in the Unplugged set). Pilgrim was essentially what most of Clapton's albums (outside of genre/artist experiments) would look like for the rest of his career, including production by Simon Climie of Climie Fisher fame. (Climie's remix of the album's title track is one of two unreleased cuts on Rarities 1983-1998, which features four live tracks, the non-LP "Theme from a Movie That Never Happened," a cover of Jimi Hendrix's "Stone Free" for a 1993 tribute album of the same name, and an unreleased version of Albert King's "Born Under a Bad Sign" cut during From the Cradle.
Rhino promises a second vinyl box due in early 2023, covering Clapton's studio albums between 2001 and 2010 plus another set of rarities. In the meantime, The Complete Reprise Studio Albums Volume 1 will be out September 30, and can be pre-ordered below.
The Complete Reprise Studio Albums Volume 1 (Reprise/Rhino, 2022) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada)
LP 1: Money and Cigarettes (Duck/Warner Bros. 23773, 1983)
LP 2-3: Behind the Sun (Duck/Warner Bros. 25166, 1985)
LP 4-5: August (Duck/Warner Bros. 25476, 1986)
LP 6-7: Journeyman (Duck/Reprise 26074, 1989)
LP 8-9: From the Cradle (Duck/Reprise 45735, 1994)
LP 10-11: Pilgrim (Duck/Reprise 46577, 1998)
LP 12: Rarities (1983-1998) (* previously unreleased)
- Stone Free
- Crossroads (Live in Birmingham, England - 1986)
- White Room (Live in Birmingham, England - 1986)
- Theme from a Movie That Never Happened (Orchestral)
- Pilgrim (Remix) *
- 32-20 Blues (Live at Royal Albert Hall, London, England - July 1993)
- County Jail Blues (Live at Royal Albert Hall, London, England - July 1993)
- Born Under a Bad Sign *
Track 1 from Stone Free: A Tribute to Jimi Hendrix - Reprise 45438, 1993
Tracks 2-3 from "Behind the Mask" U.K. single - Warner Bros. W 8461, 1987
Track 4 from "My Father's Eyes" U.K. CD single - Duck/Reprise W0441CD, 1998
Tracks 6-7 from "Motherless Child" U.K. CD single - Duck/Reprise WO271CD, 1994
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I’m underwhelmed. Some of these vinyl expansions have a blank side on the second record, but there are several studio B-sides (Jailbait), movie soundtrack selections (Heaven Is One Step Away) and CD bonus tracks (Grand Illusion) that were recorded and released for Reprise during this time period. Seems like a incomplete collection for a really high price.
Looking forward particularly to “Journeyman” on good vinyl, and a few of the other albums look good too. but the box is somewhat expensive way to get that. Hoping there might be individual LP releases …
I am surprised that there isn’t a cd box set as well .
you can find all these releases on cd for about $5 or cheaper. for later clapton collectors they have it ALL already. priced way to high. who where they aiming this for ?
Two unreleased tracks for this overpriced set of albums we already have from the first release.
Why can't someone at Reprise realize that a better option is to build a second boxed set to go after Crossroads' era… or, in the wake of all these 'all concerts' releases, expand 24 Nights?
It would take a lot of licensing, I suppose, but a disc (or two?) of Clapton's contributions to other artists' recordings would be cool.
thats a great idea ed. a clapton session musican set. most of his early sessions are (60s) are owned by universal and are a easy acccess. add the phil spector produced 45 of derek and the doms 45 of to tell the truth and its a homerun. also carnival of life with the stones from 76 is a winner to. some great hidden solos are in abundance not a rehash of records that only the very harcore fan will buy.
One of the finest pieces of music EC did during this period is "Don't Know Which Way to Go, his collab with Buddy Guy from the RUSH soundtrack (1992). Ten minutes of intense blues, it should have gone on the blank fourth side of FROM THE CRADLE or been squeezed into the Rarities LP (maybe replacing the boring Theme from a Movie That Never Happened?).
check out erics solo on pretty girls everywhere by otis spann and john mayall back to the roots track home again for some great solos.