Eric+Clapton+-+Eirik

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=Biography=  Eric Clapton was born in Ripley, Surrey, England, on March 30, 1945. His real father was a Canadian pilot but he didn't find that out until he was 53. Quiet and polite, he was characterized as an above-average student with an aptitude for art. But, from his earliest years in school, he realized something was not quite right when he wrote his name as “Eric Clapton” and his parents’ names as “Mr. and Mrs. Clapp”. At the age of nine, he learned the truth about his parentage when Pat returned to England with his six-year-old half brother for a visit. This singular event affected him deeply and was a defining moment in his life. He became moody and distant and stopped applying himself at school. Emotionally scarred by this event, Eric failed the all-important 11 Plus Exams. He was sent to St. Bede’s Secondary Modern School and two years later, entered the art branch of Holyfield Road School.

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 By 1958, Rock and Roll had exploded onto the world. For his 13th birthday, Eric asked for a guitar. Finding the inexpensive German-made Hoyer difficult to play - it had steel strings - he put it aside. In 1961, when he was 16, Eric began studying at the Kingston College of Art on a one-year probation. He was expelled at the end of that time for lack of progress as he had not submitted enough work. The reason? Guitar playing and listening to the blues dominated his waking hours.

Typical of his introspective nature, Eric looked beneath the surface and explored the roots of rock in American Blues. The blues also meshed perfectly with his self-perception as an outsider and of being “different” from other people. Sometime in 1962, he asked for his grandparents’ help in purchasing a £100 electric double cutaway Kay (a Gibson ES-335 clone) after hearing the electric blues of Freddie King, B.B. King, Muddy Waters, Buddy Guy, and others.

Eric spent his early days in music busking around Richmond and Kingston, he also began spending time in London and the West End. In early 1963, 17 year-old Eric joined his first band, The Roosters. Following the band’s demise in August 1963, he spent one month in the pop-oriented Casey Jones and The Engineers. Before turning to music as a full-time career, he supported himself as a laborer at building sites, working alongside his grandfather, a master bricklayer and plasterer.

Despite the popularity of the Yardbirs first two albums, Five Live Yardbirds and For Your Love, Clapton left in 1965, because he felt the band was veering away from its bluesy bent in favor of a more commercially viable pop focus. He joined John Mayell's Bluesbreakers almost immediately, and in the ferment of that band's purist blues sensibilities, his talent blossomed at an accelerated rate--he quickly became the defining musical force of the group. "Clapton is God" was the hue and cry of a fanatic following that propelled the band's Bluesbreakers album to No. 6 on the English pop charts. Clapton parted company with the Bluesbreakers in mid-1966 to form his own band, Cream, with bassist Jack Bruce and drummer Ginger Baker. With this lineup, Clapton sought "to start a revolution in musical thought . . . to change the world, to upset people, and to shock them." His vision was more than met as Cream quickly became the preeminent rock trio of the late sixties. On the strength of their first three albums (Fresh Cream, Disraeli Gears, and Wheels of Fire) and extensive touring, the band achieved a level of international fame approaching that of the Rolling Stones and the Beatles, and Clapton became even more almighty in the minds of his fans. In fact, the "Clapton is God" gospel contributed largely to Cream's disintegration--the band had always been a three-headed beast of warring egos, and their intense chemistry, exacerbated by the drug abuse of all three, inevitably led to a farewell tour in 1968 and the release of the Goodbye album in 1969. Early in 1969, Clapton united with Baker, bassist Rick Grech, and Traffic's Steve Winwood to record one album as Blind Faith, rock's first "supergroup." In support of their self-titled album, Blind Faith commenced a sold-out, twenty-four-city American tour, the stress of which resulted in the demise of the band less than a year after its inception. Clapton withdrew from the spotlight in the early seventies, wallowing in his addiction and then struggling to conquer it. Following the advice of the Who's Pete Townsend, he underwent a controversial but effective electro-acupuncture treatment and was fully rehabilitated. He rebounded creatively with a role in the film version of Townsend's rock opera, Tommy, and with a string of albums, including the reggae-influenced 461 Ocean Boulevard, which yielded a chart-topping single cover of Bob Marley's "I Shot the Sheriff." Some critics and fans were disappointed by Clapton's post-rehab efforts, feeling that he had abandoned his former guitar-heavy approach in favor of a more laid-back and vocal-conscious one.

In late 1990, the fates delivered Clapton a terrible blow when guitarist Stevie Ray Vaughan and Clapton road crew members Colin Smythe and Nigel Browne--all close friends of Clapton's--were killed in a helicopter crash. A few months later, he was dealt another cruel blow when Conor, his son by Italian model Lori Del Santo, fell forty-nine stories from Del Santo's Manhattan high-rise apartment to his death. Clapton channeled his shattering grief into writing the heart-wrenching 1992 Grammy-winning tribute to his son, "Tears in Heaven." (Clapton received a total of six Grammys that year for the single and for the album Unplugged.)

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Discography
Danger (2006) 24 Nights (2005) Back Home (2005) 20th Century Masters The Millennium Collection (2004) Me And Mr. Johnson (2004) Starsky & Hutch (2004) Hall of Fame (2003) Martin Scorsese Presents The Blues: Eric Clapton (2003) One More Car, One More Rider (2002) One More Car, One More Rider [DVD] (2002) Legendary: Steel Guitar Tribute To Eric Clapton (2001) Eric Clapton & the Yardbirds: The Yardbird Years (2001) Reptile (2001) Eric Clapton and Friends (2001) Riding With The King (2000) Clapton Chronicles - The Best Of Eric Clapton (1999) Blues (1999) Eric Clapton/Jimmy Page/Jeff Beck (1999) Blues Power (1999) Star Profiles (1998) U.K. Blues (1998) Rarities (1998) Eric Clapton (3 Disc Set) (1998) Pilgrim (1998) Backtrackin' (1997) Stages (1996) Crossroads 2: Live...Seventies (1996) Eric Clapton's Rainbow Concert [Expanded] (1995) Eric Clapton's Rainbow Concert (1995) The Cream Of Clapton (1995) From The Cradle (1994) Unplugged (1992) Journeyman (1989) Crossroads (1988) August (1986) Behind The Sun (1985) Time Pieces Vol. 2: Live In The 70s (1985) Money And Cigarettes (1983) Timepieces-The Best Of Eric Clapton (1982) Another Ticket (1981) Just One Night (1980) Just One Night (Polydor) (1980) Backless (1978) Slowhand (1977) No Reason To Cry (1976) E.C. Was Here (1975) There's One In Every Crowd (1975) 461 Ocean Boulevard (1974) Layla And Other Assorted Love Songs (1970) Eric Clapton (1970) media type="custom" key="4790293" width="40" height="40" media type="custom" key="4790339" width="40" height="40"

Pictures
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Eric Clapton - Tears in heaven
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Eric Clapton - Circus left town
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Eric Clapton - Change the world
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Sources:
[|http://www.rollingstone.com/] [|http://www.eric-clapton.co.uk/] [|http://en.wikipedia.org/] [|http://ericclaptonportal.com/]

[|http://www.imdb.com/]

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