Is Eric Clapton overrated? Tracii Guns thinks so. Speaking to Dee Snider on his Shout It Out Loudcast, the L.A. Guns guitarist argues that Clapton was at his peak with Cream – but failed to hit the same heights afterwards.
“Cream, for me, Cream would be Clapton’s pinnacle,” he says. “It’s like, dirty guitar sounds, wah-wah pedal, man, fuckin’ going for it.
But after that, he didn’t do that. But when he was in The Yardbirds, Jeff Beck, man — he’s got the fuzz pedal, he’s got the wah-wah pedal.
He was moving forward, and then this excuse [for Clapton], ‘Well, yeah, but he’s a blues guy.’ Everybody’s a fucking blues guy!”
He continues, “I’m not trying to bang on Clapton… But, you know, you talk about underrated guys. What about the fucking overrated guys? You’re gonna put Clapton with Jeff Beck? In what reality?”
While Guns isn’t sold on Clapton, it’s clear that he’s a fan of The Yardbirds, and he even calls them his second-favourite band.
He adds, “I could do without Clapton, you know? I could do without his personality, but The Yardbirds are my second-favourite band, because that’s the precursor to Led Zeppelin. Also, I have everything they ever recorded, demo tapes, everything. Clapton ain’t the guy, man, Beck’s the guy.”
Guns is a big admirer of Jimmy Page, who spent time in The Yardbirds before founding Led Zeppelin. “I always wonder if Jimmy Page has missed the boat of live performance now,” he says of the now 80-year-old guitarist, “But it freaks me out, man. Am I never gonna see Page live?”
Meanwhile, Guns has also recently been discussing the upcoming generation of guitarists, explaining that he looks out for those playing live rather than those “farming followers on Instagram.”
He told Guitarist, “Art is about the identity of the creator. I relate to the ones who go out and tour; I love the lifestyle, you know? The lifestyle of someone sitting at an Ikea computer desk, shredding guitar, day after day, like, I don’t want any part of that lifestyle.”
