Blues Breakers: With Eric Clapton (Rm) (Deluxe Edition) (2CD) [Deluxe Edition, Original recording remastered, Extra tracks]

This is a two-disc deluxe edition of the famous & influential "Beano" album. Disc one contains both the mono original release (1966) and the stereo version (1969) of John Mayall's Bluesbreakers with Eric Clapton album.

For a review of disc one, I would refer you to many existing reviews of the original release of this important album. I can add little to all that's been said before, other than to say listen carefully to Have You Heard and Stepping Out. And Ramblin' On My Mind features a young Eric on vocals in the style he came to develop in his solo career.

Disc two (the reason I bought the deluxe edition) contains 19 extra tracks, and is the interesting part if, like me, you already own the original version of the Bluesbreakers album on CD. Extra tracks 1-13 are both live and in the studio. For instance, there are some BBC radio live in the studio broadcasts from 1965 & early 1966 and some recording studio session tracks, which predated the album. Sound quality is quite good on tracks 1-13 and a couple of those tracks highlight (even at that early stage) Eric Clapton's playing in the style he is known for.

But best of all, extra tracks 14 to 19 were recorded live at the Flamingo Club in London in March & April 1966. Those recordings are often primitive, raw, muddy & distorted, but you'll hear some of Clapton's most fiery and fluid playing on the blues guitar standards 14.They Call It Stormy Monday, 17.Have You Ever Loved A Woman and 19.Hoochie Coochie Man. Stormy Monday is the same track that's on John Mayall's Looking Back, and tracks 17 & 19 (above), amongst others, are the same tracks that were released on John Mayall's Primal Solos. There are nevertheless 9 unreleased tracks on disc 2.

This album is from the era when Eric Clapton played a Gibson Les Paul and developed his reputation as "God". It's a must-have album for Eric Clapton fans, and this deluxe edition, packaging the original album, 19 extra tracks and a 20 page booklet, gives you the best comprehension of how it all happened. As they say, the rest is history.

.....and whilst I have praised Clapton as the musical giant he was to become, credit should be given to John Mayall for being an astute & influential band-leader, mentor to a young Eric and a catalyst of the London blues scene.

Another attempt to issue the definitive edition of the legendary Bluesbreakers album that falls slightly short of the mark. The mono and stereo mixes on disc 1 are excellently done but simply replicate the single disc issue featuring the same material released a few years ago. This, therefore, sheds no new light on this fertile period of the second British blues boom. Disc 2 features some BBC sessions along with the familiar Immediate and Purdah 45's and half a dozen live tracks, in poor sound quality, that have been available before.

This is a big disappointment and is a missed opportunity which could have been avoided if the compilers had made any attempt to research the easily available archive information from this time. John Mayall himself was known to have kept meticulous records of sessions, gigs, personnel and recording dates and I'm sure would have been more than happy to contribute his knowledge in order to preserve his legacy in the best possible manner.

Anyone expecting to hear more of Clapton's stunning guitar work from this time is in for a big disappointment. Many of the songs from the BBC sessions presented here have nothing more than rhythm guitar low in the mix. This is the case with the first three songs on disc 2 and despite the session date given being after the point where Clapton joined the band, I suspect it was actually recorded earlier with Roger Dean on guitar. The three songs from the October 25th session are from the time when Clapton had taken a sabbatical and had been replaced by Geoff Krivit. The third BBC session featured on the disc includes only two songs out of at least five, and possibly six, which are known to have been recorded with Clapton in the band, one of those missing being a rare live version of the instrumental, Hideaway. This session has been bootlegged in excellent sound quality and so it's omission from this set is inexcusable.

All in all the "Deluxe" edition does nothing to enhance the importance and excitement of this classic album and the poor selection of additional material on disc 2 turns what should have been a worthy project into a complete waste of time and money. Five stars for the original album - 1 star for this reissue

Few albums have had greater impact than John Mayall's 1966 landmark "Blues Breakers With Eric Clapton." Released by the Decca label in Britain on 22 July 1966, literally days after Clapton left the Bluesbreakers and just a week before Cream's debut, it went all the way to #6, a pretty mean feat, since Mayall's band had never had a hit single. This may have been a first in Britain.

Of course, this is the album that set the blues and guitar worlds aflame and established Eric Clapton's name worldwide as the most passionate of musical interpreters. If you haven't yet heard "Beano" -- as it is affectionately known, because Clapton is pictured reading a "Beano" comic book on its cover -- then you ain't heard nuthin' yet! This is the stuff of legends.

From the album's first notes, you realize that you're in guitar heaven, as "Slowhand" shows us the way electric guitar can and should be played. Clapton's virtuoso playing is white hot throughout. Playing with a maturity beyond his 21 years, the young Eric Clapton so influenced the guitar world that Gibson eventually reissued the Les Paul model -- out-of-production since 1960 -- which Clapton then played.

John Mayall's Bluesbreakers served -- and serves still today -- as a finishing school for great musicians and sidemen (Clapton, Peter Green, Mick Taylor, Walter Trout, Coco Montoya, John McVie, Jack Bruce, Aynsley Dunbar, Mick Fleetwood and others). Mayall's proselytizing the blues (he's 73 years old!), his songwriting skills, and his other musical talents should not be ignored nor taken lightly.