Label: DCC Compact Classics (US), GZS 1022
Style: Psychedelic Rock, Blues Rock, Hard Rock
Country: London, England
Time: 46:35
Format: Flac Tracks 16/44,1 kHz
Size: 284 Mb
Charts: UK #6, AUS #10, FRA #20, FIN #4, US #39. AUS, UK & US: Gold.
Almost as soon as Cream were formed in July 1966, they entered Rayrik Studios at Chalk Farm, London, to begin work on their debut single and album with Robert Stigwood producing and John Timperley as engineer. Clapton later noted that the budget was minuscule, working with four track machines and basically running each song a few times through until they got a satisfactory take, with minimal overdubbing afterward. The first sessions at Rayrik on August 3 produced the outtakes "Coffee Song", "You Make Me Feel" and "Beauty Queen", followed later in the month by the group's debut single "Wrapping Paper", a music hall influenced piece designed to showcase the group's stylistic versatility, but which was received with puzzlement upon its October release by fans expecting a blues-oriented sound.
After the band moved to Ryemuse Studios (now known as Mayfair), the bulk of the album was recorded between September and November, neatly divided between old blues covers ("Spoonful", "Cat's Squirrel", "Rollin' And Tumblin'", "I'm So Glad", "Four Until Late") and original material penned by bassist Jack Bruce, with two contributions by Ginger Baker ("Sweet Wine" and his groundbreaking extended drum solo "Toad") and two by Bruce's first wife Janet Godfrey, who co-wrote "Sleepy Time Time" with Jack and "Sweet Wine" with Ginger. A session in September also produced the single "I Feel Free" (included on the US version of the album), the first product of the songwriting team of Jack Bruce and bohemian poet Pete Brown which proved a more typical representation of their sound than "Wrapping Paper"; released on the same day as the album, it climbed to No. 11 in the UK charts.
Bruce later said that the opening song "N.S.U." was written for the band's first rehearsal. "It was like an early punk song... the title meant "non-specific urethritis. It didn't mean an NSU Quickly – which was one of those little 1960s mopeds. I used to say it was about a member of the band who had this venereal disease. I can't tell you which one... except he played guitar." The mellow pop of "Dreaming" showcased Bruce's ghostly falsetto vocal style, which was also used on "I Feel Free" and would become more prominent on later releases. Clapton's lengthy, swirling solos on "Sweet Wine" and "Spoonful" pointed toward psychedelia and heavy metal, with Clapton employing much echo, fuzz and feedback, which had been directly inspired by his first meeting with Jimi Hendrix on October 1. Overall, the group's fusion of blues with hard rock and improvisational jazz on this record proved seminal on the development of rock music from that point forward.
(en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fresh_Cream)
01. I Feel Free (Bruce-Brown) (02:56)
02. N.S.U. (Jack Bruce) (02:45)
03. Sleepy Time Time (Bruce-Godfrey) (04:22)
04. Dreaming (Jack Bruce) (02:02)
05. Sweet Wine (Baker-Godfrey) (03:19)
06. Cat's Squirrel (Traditional, Arr. by S. Splurge) (03:09)
07. Four Until Late (Robert Johnson, Arr. by Eric Clapton) (02:10)
08. Rollin' And Tumblin' (McKinley Morganfield aka Muddy Waters) (04:44)
09. I'm So Glad (Skip James) mixed to mono only (04:01)
10. Toad (Ginger Baker) (05:16)
11. Spoonful (Willie Dixon) (bonus track) (06:33)
12. Wrapping Paper (Bruce-Brown) (bonus track) (02:26)
13. The Coffee Song (Colton-Smith) (bonus track) (02:45)
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