ERIC CLAPTNON, Arc Angels 16.05.2009, Royal Albert Hall - London

words by: Valyo Paskov, photo: Valyo Paskov.

It’s great when you have the chance to make a dream come true. Since the age of 16 my dream was to see Eric Clapton live, I have all his albums on CD’s, four books on his live and some more fan items. But if there is one venue you MUST see him, it’s undoubtfully The Royal Albert Hall in London.

I was lucky enough (and received a little help from my friends, thanks Miriam and Christina) achieve my teenage dream and I managed to obtain this piece of paper that gave me access to a stunning, once in a lifetime experience.

The seat that I got was absolutely perfect: 6th row, just in the center. I even couldn’t believe how close I were from the musicians, literally 6 to 8 meters parted me from His Majesty Slowhand.

A little bit of history: the first appearance of Eric Clapton at The Royal Albert Hall, a place that today he calls “home”, dates back to 1968 with the band Cream. The show I attended was his 147th, and on the 20.05.2009 he will celebrate his 150th show at Royal Albert Hall. Quite impressive! Every year from 1983 Eric is doing at least 7 concerts there, and the apogee of this strong relationship was in 1991 when came out the beautiful double CD/VHS (no DVDs at that time!) 24 Nights. During this performance he changed 3 bands: from a blues quartet, to an entire 9 piece band to a symphonic orchestra.

But let me tell you happened in 2009, just a year after Clapton announced that he’s going to retire from active touring.

. Of course it was quite uncertain that he was going to keep his promise, and as we see, he launched his small Spring Tour 2009 in Dublin, passing via Manchester, Liverpool and finishing with his traditional annual performance at The Royal Albert Hall which this year is make up of 11 gigs. I had the chance to see the very first one.

The support act was provided by The ARC ANGELS which were, let’s say a supergroup formed by Doyle Bramhall II, Charlie Sexton as well as Chris Layton from SRV's Double Trouble. The guys played their blues-rock which suited very well to the global atmosphere, without standing out with something extraordinary.

The gig took off with the electric blues 'Going Down Slow', which was a very good choice, which broke the ice and made everybody feel very comfortable, followed by the 80’s ballad 'Anything For Your Love'. Usually Eric Clapton plays the blues standard 'Key To The Highway' acoustic, but this time though he presented an amplified version with great guitar work . A new ballad followed, 'Old Love' during which the presence of a dozen LED screens was unveiled, and that made the ambiance even more intimate.

'I Shot The Sheriff' is a classic song in the repertoire all the way back to the 80’s, but that night Clapton presented a stunning 7minute version which blew everybody away. After a 40 seconds set-change, we had an acoustic band in front of us, who undertooke the unavoidable 'Layla' and frisky 'Lay Down Sally'. A very resent entry in a cover version of the old Bob Dylan song 'Not Dark Yet', which I didn’t enjoy very much, but it seemed that I was the only one.

Two more ballads filled just, and then it was just about the time for a classics one : 'Badge', followed by the breathtaking blues 'Little Queen of spades' and my favourite 'Before You Accuse Me'. The unavoidable 'Wonderful Tonight' and J J Cale’s 'Cocaine' closed the set.

Of course we had an encore, 'Crossroads' kicked in… and it was all over. 2 hours and 10 minutes ran away like a moment, one of the best in my life so far. At the very end I was lucky enough and grab a pic for my big collection, and that gave me even better mood that I was in, and I went to the merchanising to get me a T-Shirt, yeeah.