Not just Clappers's version of J.J. Cale's song in general (as found on 1979's Slowhand): this version, also from 1979, in particular. It's from a documentary made at the time called Eric Clapton and His Rolling Hotel (named for the fact that the tour travelled across the US on a train), which to date the man himself refuses to be generally released because, to say the least, it shows him cataclysmically trolleyed and very, very nakedly personal about his personal troubles, not least about his relationship with other band members and with his soon-to-be wife Patty Boyd - not a good time of his life, to say the least. But musically, it was perhaps the last gasp of a really free and uninhibited 34-year old guitarist, before he gave up the booze and drugs and settled down into comfortable, undeniably happier and contented but, to this fan at least, somewhat bloodless musicianship. He was never as free on stage again. It speaks volumes that this performace was from a time in his life when Clapton's alcoholism was at its peak and he was up to around three bottles of Courvoisier a day - therefore he was absolutely blasted out of his mind pretty well 24/7, this show included. (There were several shows where he was too pissed even to stand upright, and he used to play flat on his back on stage with the microphone lying down on the stage next to him). Not too long after, he collapsed in his hotel room in excruciating pain and was rushed to hospital, where it was discovered that several years of constant boozing had caused almost his entire stomach to be eaten away by ulcers, and for a few days he was on the verge of death.
And he still played like this.
Fuck. me. Gently. Bentley
