Long Review of Eric Clapton's Memphis Show

I have always enjoyed Eric Clapton. "Lay Down Sally" is on the soundtrack of my childhood. "Layla" (the ending) is the song I want in the scene of my death in the movie of my life (It's in pre pre pre production). "I Can't Stand It" is the song that escorted me out of the most damaging relationship of my life. "Modern Girl" helped me put it all back together again. Then, in 2008, "Wonderful Tonight" an autobiographical novel by Pattie Boyd was released. Oh. My. God. Eric Clapton was the worst boyfriend/husband ever!! But, something about this story intrigued me. I knew he had written "Layla" and "Wonderful Tonight" about Pattie, and how could a love story based in so much longing go so wrong?? So, I read Eric Clapton's soon after released autobiography, just to get both sides. Oh. My. God. Eric Clapton was the worst boyfriend/husband ever. And, he admitted it. The love story that began with "Layla" ended with bitter songs such as "She's Waiting" and "Miss You". The most ironic fact of the matter is that Eric wrote "Wonderful Tonight" not as a love song, but out of mean sarcasm; because Pattie was taking too long to get ready and Eric was ready to get loaded. And who knew that "Bell Bottom Blues" was also about Pattie? Well, I guess Pattie and Eric knew...as well as Pattie's husband, George Harrison. Knowing all of this backstory only fueled my passion for Eric Clapton's music. I relistened to every song, now plump with satisfaction that I knew what it was really about. When the tickets went on sale for his Memphis show, I bought one (yes, one...that's a whole 'nuther post) and anxiously anticipated March 5th.



Before I get into the meat of the review, let me first make a disclaimer. I am not a music critic. I KNOW music. I LOVE music. I would rather be blind than deaf for fear of never being able to hear chord progressions again. I have my opinions on what's good. What's good for me, is probably not what's good for you; but that is what makes the world go round.



I had a seat in the nosebleed section of the FedEx forum, but honestly, there isn't a bad seat in the place. For some reason, I always seem to find the seat either directly in front of or beside the blowhard music "expert" (Jersey Boys row mates). This time was no exception. This man behind me was bragging about his music knowledge, much to the admiration of the others around him. I instantly hated this idiot. Oh, he had been to every concert ever. Each preconcert muzak song that came on prompted a story about this asshole's glory days, each involving a ratty ass Subaru, the Mid South Coliseum, and dope. "Green Eyed Lady" came on and this doofus sat there and said, "Yeah, I saw them too". His date said, "Who sings this?" He couldn't remember. He tried to play it off by throwing out some names, "Norman Greenbaum? No. Pilot? No. The Guess Who? No." I turned around, looked at him, and stated in a voice loud enough for his now dumfuzzled followers to hear, "Its Sugarloaf." WIN. "Yeah yeah yeah! That's it!" he exclaimed. The irony is that when he was allegedly at the Sugarloaf concert, I wasn't even a gleam in my father's eye. He was just served by someone half his age, who by all appearances, should NOT know that. But that's me, music expert. Anyway, that shut his fat ass up about music. He then began to pontificate on restaurants, and by the looks of him, he was the expert in the this category, I let him have his podium back.



But I digress. Roger Daltrey took the stage at precisely 7:30pm. Which was odd, since the arena was only half full. I expected some no name European band to open, and apparently so did everyone else. The familiar strains of "I Can See For Miles" filled the air, and thus began a stampede of slackers trying to get to their seats. I won't go into Roger Daltrey's performance here, he isn't the reason I bought my ticket. But I will say that I was pleasantly surprised and even inclined to research some of his new stuff. The hour he played was an enjoyable one. After his set and another half hour of intermission, Eric Clapton took the stage. Another disclaimer here: I love 1970/80's Eric Clapton. Not so much 1990's Eric.



He did a couple of blues numbers ("Goin Down Slow" and "Key To The Highway"), then brought out a Derek and the Dominoes relic ("Tell The Truth"). "Old Love" a song he cowrote with Robert Cray (awesomeness) was next. By this time, I had settled into the realization that there would likely not be any "Bad Love", "Pretending", or "She's Waiting" junking up the set list (which is a disappointment). The guitar playing was so clear and perfect though, that I didn't mind anymore. I settled into my seat and allowed the chords to knock me upside the head. I swear to God, the music coming out of the amps was so beautiful, I didn't know whether to dab my eyes or pump my fist (When is "Jersey Shore" coming back on anyway??). Some more standards followed ("I Shot the Sheriff" and "Nobody Knows You When You're Down and Out") then on to the "Journeyman" days with "Runnin on Faith". The next three songs were crowd favorites: "Layla" (sadly, the 1992 version), "Rock and Roll Heart" (thanks Verizon!), and "Badge". This was where the show got a whole lot better, at least judging by crowd response. People woke up, sat up, and clapped along. The final three songs were successful in whipping the laid back (and likely, now high crowd) into an air guitar frenzy: "Before You Accuse Me", "Wonderful Tonight" and "Cocaine". Two things here. Number one, it cracked me up to see all the couples burrow into each other for "Wonderful Tonight", knowing what I know. In reality, they might as well had embraced to the strains of "Used to Love Her" by GNR. Secondly, I have never seen so many freshly scrubbed white kids get so worked up about cocaine. The way these assholes were fist pumping and shouting along (just to the word "Cocaine"...they didn't know the rest, surprisingly.) you would have thought that they came straight outta SOFO. These are the same people, removed from this high spirited environment, that fan their faces when a smoker is within breathing distance. That was it. Eric finished "Cocaine" (tee hee) and waved at the crowd. Then he left. No fanfare. Of course, Iphones all over the arena immediately pulled up the concert lighter app and that alone could have been a commercial for Apple. (I suppose the Verizon Mongoloid also has this app, but everyone knows that the Iphone is the superior product)



After a couple of minutes, Eric and band returned and did "Crossroads", which earned a standing ovation. Then, the mass exodus. It has just occurred to me, a million words later, that I should probably do another post about all the drama that I saw unfolding around me, all evening. There was romance, passion, a cooling off, rejection, and then rage...all in the two seats in front of me. On the way out of the forum, I witnessed a range of human emotion...from elation to vomiting. All in all, it was an awesome show which opened my ears to parts of Eric Clapton's repertoire that I might have otherwise skipped on the cd. On a final note...I parked at Parking Can Be Fun on Union (smug parking secret). As I tweeted last night, Parking can be fun, I suppose; or it could be a CF (urbandictionary.com). Last night...it was a CF. I felt so smug parking there, some distance away from the forum, because I didn't mind the gritty Second St crawl. I consider myself fairly street smart and I knew not to linger or marvel. All that smugness came to a screeching halt; however, as I made the SLOW descent down the tiers of the garage, along with half of the mid south population. Smugness returned; however, when I pulled up to the cashier and paid $3. Friday night, March 5th, 2010 was well worth the money.