Classic Rock
Sons of Cream, the trio of Malcolm Bruce and Kofi Baker with guitarist and singer Rob Johnson, are releasing their first album, “Half and Half”, in January. It’s coming out on Marshall Records, and the title is literal: six of their own songs and six by Cream, the band Malcolm’s and Kofi’s fathers, Jack Bruce and Ginger Baker, played in.
The Cream songs are “NSU”, “I Feel Free”, “SWLABR”, “Sweet Wine”, “Tales of Brave Ulysses” and “We’re Going Wrong”, all from the era of “Fresh Cream” and “Disraeli Gears”, the band’s first two albums, and they take up the second half of the record. The first half is new from start to finish, from “Strange Vibrations” to “I’m Dreaming”. The double single already on streaming services pairs one from each half: “Strange Vibrations” and “Tales of Brave Ulysses”.
“We didn’t want to make a ‘retro’ record,” says Malcolm Bruce, who produced it. “Even with the Cream songs we wanted to put our own stamp on the material, not play it note for note like a tribute band.”
They recorded it at Marshall Studio, inside the amplifier factory in Milton Keynes. Chris Sheldon mixed it and Christian Wright mastered it at Abbey Road. The trio head back to the United States on a tour that starts in Nashville on 14 January and, after a break between 21 February and 15 April, ends on 2 May in St. Charles, Illinois. The announcement lists no European dates.
Text by Enric Vilaplana