Artist: Clapton, Eric
Label: Polydor Records
Release: 1980
Eric Clapton’s career was a popular target for all sorts of misfortune at the turn of the 1980s. After his trip to the Far East, so brilliantly documented on the superb Just One Night, Eric was once again wrestling with serious health problems, which on one of the following tours almost finished the guitarist off for good. Alcoholism and the always turbulent goings-on inside Clapton’s inner circle bring us to Eric’s seventh album, one of his most sentimental works, which also marks the last act of the guitarist’s partnership with Polydor.
Another Ticket is a masterpiece in every respect. The album is graced by a cozy atmosphere of sensitive musical address, seasoned just right with sharp guitar “manipulation” that deceptively meanders between the spontaneous and the extremely disciplined. The by now proverbial consistency of Eric’s earlier works makes sure there’s no shortage of highlights on Another Ticket either; in fact, they line up in a tidy column, in exemplary order, one right after another. All the way from the inspired, finely crafted guitar toying of Something Special to the clear bluesy references that, in the good old Clapton tradition, slowly but surely dig up emotional sparks in the listener that were previously buried ever so deep. Once again Eric doesn’t skimp on his headstrong yet astonishingly steady level of quality, which, at the dawn of the new decade, boldly carries on diligently marking the escalation of the guitarist’s expression.
Mood-wise, this is an extremely contrasting album, and thanks to its capricious character it demands heaping amounts of attention, like a spoiled child. The guitarist presumably had plenty on his mind at the time, and you can feel it on Another Ticket at every step. In this relentlessly spinning roulette of emotionally charged ideas, there’s no shortage of religiously inspired motifs either, which no doubt offer Eric a certain refuge from the troubles of the world and, in the end, from himself. Hold Me Lord is in many ways exactly that, a retrospective pilgrimage of the soul in the vein of Presence Of The Lord, though loaded with a more substantial pinch of playfulness. Floating Bridge is a venomous bluesy “lullaby” that clearly reveals the guitarist’s roots, buried deep in the mystical tradition of American blues. Armed with more than just guitar wizardry, with his out-of-the-ordinary take on Waters’ Blow Wind Blow Clapton once again shows himself to be the undisputed king of innovative interpretations of blues classics. This time Eric even toys with the idea of slyly imitating Muddy’s vocal lines, which you can catch in the occasional rasp of his voice. Not necessarily a recipe for success, but this time it doesn’t bring Clapton any nasty side effects. He gets away with it unscathed on I Cant Stand It too. This pleasant tune, which impresses with a pronounced drift toward popular waters, boldly gathers its strength in a simply designed melodic line that soon found its way to the top of the world’s charts. Simplicity, rounded off with a touch of perceptive romance, adorns the set of Black Rose and the title track Another Ticket, songs unimaginably mellow for the period, with which Eric tirelessly convinces even the most stubborn skeptics that experimenting with more listenable themes makes sense. But don’t let this kind of experimentation throw you. Toward the end of the album, on the wings of Catch Me If You Can and the dizzying Rita Mae, two phenomenal blues-rock carousels, Clapton finally gets down to some serious guitar stretching that, after a long time, once again recalls the guitarist’s best years, when, as an enthusiasm-filled young man, he uncompromisingly clipped the competition’s wings. Some fifteen years later, time had also selflessly done its part in the guitarist’s musical as well as personal development. Eric Clapton had, relatively speaking, sobered up in the meantime, which is best seen on Another Ticket, a record that, rather than in individualism, looks for solutions in the spirit of collectivism and harmony. A little unusual, perhaps, but always worthy of admiration!
Another Ticket confirms the fact that Eric Clapton, despite nearly disastrous shipwrecks in his personal life, was still in dazzling form and capable of even the boldest musical exploration. It will delight above all those who, when sniffing around the legacy of the great guitarist, prefer to give his experiments with reggae and country influences a wide berth. With an album that will probably forever stay hidden right behind the commercially much mightier predecessors Slowhand and Backless, the listener is treated to a wide palette of sparkling musical play, tightly intertwined with a more strongly emphasized bluesy turn that, after years of experimenting with genre-diverse themes, finally puts the very essence of the blues back in the spotlight.
Lineup
Eric Clapton: vocals, guitar
Chris Stainton: keyboards
Albert Lee: vocals, guitar
Gary Brooker: keyboards
Henry Spinetti: drums
Dave Markee: bass
Production
Tom Dowd
Track list
1. Something Special
2. Black Rose
3. Blow Wind Blow
4. Another Ticket
5. I Can’t Stand It
6. Hold Me Lord
7. Floating Bridge
8. Catch Me If You Can
9. Rita Mae
Album length: 38.34
