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Eric Clapton Quotes

Total quotes: 33
“There was a band called Blue Cheer, who I think were probably the originators of heavy metal because they didn’t really have traditional roots in the blues. They didn’t have a mission. It was just about being loud. Cream were very loud, too, and we got caught up in having huge banks of Marshall amps just for the hell of it. But we had a really strong foundation in blues and jazz. Led Zeppelin took up our legacy. But then they took it somewhere else that I didn’t really have a great deal of admiration for.”
— Eric Clapton, Eric Clapton on Cream: "I was in a confrontational situation 24 hours a day…"- Uncut
Tagged: cream, Blue Cheer, Heavy Metal, Led Zeppelin, Blues, Jazz, Marshall Amps, Loud
“When he first came to England, you know English people have a very big thing towards a spade. They really love that magic thing, the sexual thing. They all fall for that sort of thing. Everybody and his brother in England still sort of think that spades have big dicks. And Jimi came over and exploited that to the limit, the fucking tee. Everybody fell for it.”
— Eric Clapton, Eric Clapton: The Rolling Stone Interview
Tagged: Jimi Hendrix, England, Big Dicks, Racial Slurs, Racial Stereotypes, Spade
“If I can't see The Who, then I'm not really bothered and I won't listen to them very much. They're tight and they're all very heavy, but musically I don't think they are going in a very extreme direction. They stick to their records and things like that.”
— Eric Clapton, Eric Clapton: The Rolling Stone Interview
Tagged: The Who, LIve Music
“People can go out and buy a record, you know, like an Englebert Humperdink [sic] record, then everybody can say it's the best record available. Which is rubbish. Doesn't mean to say because it's popular it's the best music.”
— Eric Clapton, Eric Clapton: The Rolling Stone Interview
Tagged: Engelbert Humperdinck, Records, Rubbish, Pop music
“Music thrives wildly in England because they are jealous of someone else's success. They're jealous so they have to do better.”
— Eric Clapton, Eric Clapton: The Rolling Stone Interview
Tagged: Music, England, Jealousy
“I get quite bored listening to myself play the guitar because I'm not a very good audience. If there are people there, you go further.”
— Eric Clapton, Eric Clapton: The Rolling Stone Interview
Tagged: Bored, Guitar, LIve Music
“It's a very jealous thing. They're afraid of American music being too far ahead of them. They've got this fantasy, they deny it.”
— Eric Clapton, Eric Clapton: The Rolling Stone Interview
Tagged: Jealous, Envy, British Invasion, Xenophobia, American Music, Fantasy, Denial
“The only thing I’m concerned with now is being in my seventies and being able to be proficient. I mean, I’m going deaf, I’ve got tinnitus, my hands just about work. I’m hoping that people will come along and see me just because, or maybe more than because I’m a curiosity. I know that is part of it, because it’s amazing to myself I’m still here.”
— Eric Clapton, Eric Clapton admits he’s going deaf, discusses difficulties of performing live in new interview
Tagged: Aging, Deafness, Tinnitus, Curiosity
“We were club musicians—low-ceiling places where you'd share a dressing room with the other band. When you came in, they were taking their trousers off. Very tight, small places—that was what I was most comfortable with. Doing arenas—I'm still not used to it. I like to create a little space in front of me where I think I'm playing in a little room.”
— Eric Clapton, Eric Clapton on Addiction, Cream's Brilliance, the Future of the Guitar
Tagged: Club Musicians, concerts, Arenas, Claustrophobia
“I'm determined to stick around as long as I can. I'm watching everything. I go to the doctor's at the slightest sign of anything.”
— Eric Clapton, Eric Clapton on Addiction, Cream's Brilliance, the Future of the Guitar
Tagged: Longevity, Health
“I just have to face the guy that I became when I was fueled on drugs and alcohol. It's incomprehensible to me, in a way, that I got so far out. And there was no one to challenge me. Because I may have become quite intimidating. People said they couldn't challenge me because I came back twice as strong.”
— Eric Clapton, Eric Clapton on Addiction, Cream's Brilliance, the Future of the Guitar
Tagged: Addiction, Drugs, Alcohol, Recovery
“In my lowest moments, the only reason I didn't commit suicide was that I knew I wouldn't be able to drink anymore if I was dead.”
— Eric Clapton, Clapton: The Autobiography
Tagged: Suicide, Alcoholism, Rock Bottom
“Music will always find its way to us, with or without business, politics, religion, or any other bullshit attached. Music survives everything, and like God, it is always present. It needs no help, and suffers no hindrance.”
— Eric Clapton, Clapton: The Autobiography
Tagged: Music, Politics, Religion, Bullshit, God
“All I am certain of right now is that I don't want to go anywhere, and that's not bad for someone who always used to run.”
— Eric Clapton, Clapton: The Autobiography
Tagged: Settling Down
“It's late in the evening; she's wondering what clothes to wear
She puts on her makeup and brushes her long blonde hair
And then she asks me, Do I look all right?
And I say, ‘Yes, you look wonderful tonight.’”
— Eric Clapton, Wonderful Tonight
Tagged: Makeup, Blonde Hair, wonderful
“The music scene as I look at it today is a little different from when I was growing up. The percentages are roughly the same—95 percent rubbish, 5 percent pure.”
— Eric Clapton, Clapton: The Autobiography
Tagged: Music, Rubbish, Pure
“I was too shy to ask any of the girls I knew at school, but there was this new girl in class, and because she was new, it was open season on her. As luck would have it, she was put at the desk directly in front of me in the classroom, so one morning I plucked up courage and asked her, without any idea of what the words meant, ‘Do you fancy a shag?’ She looked at me with a bemused expression, because she obviously didn't have a clue what I was talking about, but at playtime she went and told another girl what I'd said, and asked what it meant. After lunch I was summoned to the headmaster's office, where, after being quizzed as to exactly what I had said to her and being made to promise to apologize, I was bent over and given six of the best. I left in tears, and the whole episode had a dreadful effect on me, as from that point on I tended to associate sex with punishment, shame, and embarrassment, feelings that colored my sexual life for years.”
— Eric Clapton, Clapton: The Autobiography
Tagged: Shy, Shag, Sex, punishment, Shame, Embarrassment, Imprinting
“At first I was quite happy going to school. Most of the kids who lived on the Green next to us started at the same time, but as the months went by, and it dawned on me that this was it for the long haul, I began to panic. The feelings of insecurity I had about my home life made me hate school. All I wanted to be was anonymous, which kept me out of entering any kind of competitive event. I hated anything that would single me out and get me unwanted attention.”
— Eric Clapton, Clapton: The Autobiography
Tagged: School, Insecurity, Anonymity, Panic
“Early in my childhood, when I was about six or seven, I began to get the feeling that there was something different about me. Maybe it was the way people talked about me as if I weren't in the room.”
— Eric Clapton, Clapton: The Autobiography
Tagged: Feeling Different, Childhood
“I have always been resistant to doctrine, and any spirituality I had experienced thus far in my life had been much more abstract and not aligned with any recognized religion. For me, the most trustworthy vehicle for spirituality had always proven to be music. It cannot be manipulated, or politicized, and when it is, that becomes immediately obvious.”
— Eric Clapton, Clapton: The Autobiography
Tagged: Doctrine, Spirituality, Religion, Music, Manipulated, Politicized
“Would you know my name
If I saw you in heaven
Will it be the same
If I saw you in heaven
I must be strong, and carry on
Cause I know I don't belong
Here in heaven

Would you hold my hand
If I saw you in heaven
Would you help me stand
If I saw you in heaven
I'll find my way, through night and day
Cause I know I just can't stay
Here in heaven”
— Eric Clapton, Tears In Heaven
Tagged: Death, Loss, Tears, Heaven
“I like solitude. I like the anomalous life. I like a quiet life.”
— Eric Clapton
Tagged: Solitude, Quiet
“It is painful to relive things that have caused emotional crises or whatever and find ways to express that musically.”
— Eric Clapton
Tagged: Painful, Emotional Crises, Music, expression
“Music became a healer for me, and I learned to listen with all my being.”
— Eric Clapton, Clapton: The Autobiography
Tagged: Music, Healing
“My definition of peace is having no noise in my head.”
— Eric Clapton, 20 Essential Lessons Eric Clapton's Learned Over the Years
Tagged: Peace, Noise
“And I don't like having my picture taken. I'm almost like an old African in that sense. I think it steals a bit of the soul.”
— Eric Clapton, 20 Essential Lessons Eric Clapton's Learned Over the Years
Tagged: African, Soul
“I have regrets, obviously. Countless. One of the great regrets was getting involved with George Harrison's marriage. What is that fabulous song that Dylan plays? ‘Don't go mistaking paradise for that home across the road.’ I don't know what inspired that song, but my experience is exactly what it's about.”
— Eric Clapton, 20 Essential Lessons Eric Clapton's Learned Over the Years
Tagged: Regrets, George Harrison, Bob Dylan
“Up until the point when I went into treatment, I'd never asked for help from anybody. I would rather not have known the answer than have to ask you for help. That's why treatment was fascinating for me. They deliberately put in your path as many things as they could that required you to ask someone else how it's done. Making a cup of coffee: There's a machine over there with all these components that you've got to put together to make a cup of coffee, and I just didn't know how. So I had to ask someone. Over and over, I had to ask for help. Very clever.”
— Eric Clapton, 20 Essential Lessons Eric Clapton's Learned Over the Years
Tagged: rehab, Addiction, Treatment, Dependence, Asking For Help
“Addiction doesn't negotiate.”
— Eric Clapton, 20 Essential Lessons Eric Clapton's Learned Over the Years
Tagged: Addiction, Negotiation
“From the beginning, I knew intuitively that if nothing else, music was safe, and that nobody could tell me anything about it. Music didn't need a middleman, whereas all the other things in school needed some kind of explanation.”
— Eric Clapton, 20 Essential Lessons Eric Clapton's Learned Over the Years
Tagged: Music, Intuition, Middleman
“Up until I became a father, it was all about self-obsession. But then I learned exactly what it's all about: the delight of being a servant. Olivier wrote that the greatest thing you could aspire to in life was to be a good servant.”
— Eric Clapton, 20 Essential Lessons Eric Clapton's Learned Over the Years
Tagged: Fatherhood, Self-Obsession, Service, Olivier
“One of the most beneficial things I've ever learned is how to keep my mouth shut.”
— Eric Clapton, 20 Essential Lessons Eric Clapton's Learned Over the Years
Tagged: Silence, Beneficial, Shut Your Mouth
“The blues are what I've turned to, what has given me inspiration and relief in all the trials of my life.”
— Eric Clapton
Tagged: Blues, inspiration, Relief
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