Derek and the Dominos

Derek and the Dominos was a blues-rock supergroup formed in the spring of 1970 by guitarist and singer Eric Clapton with Bobby Whitlock, Carl Radle and Jim Gordon, who had all played with him in Delaney & Bonnie & Friends. Duane Allman of the Allman Brothers Band joined the group early in the recording of their first album.

Beginnings

The group debuted at the Lyceum Theatre in London on June 14 1970, where the announcer mispronounced their provisional name of Eric and the Dynamos as Derek and the Dominos. The band took up the new name and a summer tour of England followed. From late August to early October, working at Criteria Studios in Miami with Atlantic Records producer Tom Dowd, the band recorded Layla and Other Assorted Love Songs, a double album now regarded by many critics as Clapton's masterpiece. Most of the material, including Layla (which soon became an FM radio staple) was inspired by Clapton's love for Pattie Boyd who was married to his best friend George Harrison. Clapton was seeing Pattie secretly at the time and Whitlock was dating her sister. It was not until much later that the affair was revealed; Boyd moved in with Clapton in 1974 and married him in 1979. They separated in 1985 when Clapton started a relationship with Yvonne Khan Kelly and they divorced in 1988. The two-part song Layla was recorded in separate sessions; the opening guitar section was recorded first, with the second section following several months later. The second part was an elegiac piano piece composed and played by drummer Jim Gordon; early on, he objected to it being added to Layla, but finally agreed.

Live shows

The group had many live outings during 1970 and 1971. A pair of shows at the Fillmore East in New York were recorded for the album In Concert, which later was expanded with additional material from these New York shows to become Live at the Fillmore. Several bootlegs are also available, including one with Duane Allman playing and one of a double night at the Fillmore.

The Layla album

The Layla LP was recorded by a five-piece version of the group, thanks to the unforeseen inclusion of slide guitar virtuoso Duane Allman of The Allman Brothers Band. Clapton recorded most of the album while lying on the floor strung out on drugs. The band was heavily into drugs at this time, but, unlike many artists such as The Beatles, Clapton feels this did not hurt the recording process.

A few days into the Layla sessions, Dowd, who was also producing for the Allmans, invited Clapton to an Allman Brothers outdoor concert in Miami. The two guitarists, who previously knew each other only by reputation, met backstage after the show, and then both bands moved to a studio to jam (an impromptu session that was captured on tape and released as part of the 3-CD 20th anniversary edition of Layla). Clapton and Allman "fell in love" with each other's playing and became instant friends, and Allman was immediately invited to become the fifth member of the Dominos.

When Allman and Clapton met, the Dominos had already recorded three tracks (I Looked Away, Bell Bottom Blues and Keep On Growing); Allman debuted on the fourth cut, Nobody Knows You When You're Down and Out, and contributed slide guitar to the remainder of the LP. The album was heavily blues-influenced and featured a combination of the twin guitars of Allman and Clapton, with Allman's incendiary slide-guitar as a key ingredient.

One aspect of mystique on this album is a debate over who really sang Layla. Some believe the singer is Whitlock.

Tragedy and dissolution

Tragedy dogged the group throughout its brief career. During the sessions, Clapton was devastated by the death of Jimi Hendrix; eight days previously the band had cut a version of Little Wing, which was added to the album as a tribute. One year later, on the eve of the group's first American tour, Duane Allman was killed in a motorcycle accident. Adding to Clapton's woes, the Layla album received only lukewarm reviews on release; Clapton took this personally, accelerating his spiral into drug addiction and depression.

The shattered group undertook a US tour. Despite Clapton's later admission that the tour took place amidst a barrage of drugs, mainly heroin and alcohol, it resulted in the surprisingly good live double album In Concert. But the group disintegrated messily in London just before they had completed their second LP. Although Radle worked with Clapton for several more years, the split between Clapton and Whitlock was apparently a bitter one. Radle would die of alcohol poisoning in 1981 and Jim Gordon, who was an undiagnosed schizophrenic, killed his mother with a hammer some years later during a psychotic episode. He was confined to a mental institution in 1984, where he remains today.

After the dissolution, Clapton turned away from touring and recording to nurse a heroin addiction and his intense romantic longing for Pattie Boyd-Harrison, resulting in a career hiatus interrupted only by the Concert for Bangladesh in 1972 and the Rainbow Concert in 1973 (see 1973 in music), the former organised by George Harrison and the latter by The Who's Pete Townshend to help Clapton kick the drug.

Time has only added to the reputation of the group, which is now considered among Clapton's most outstanding achievements. The 1988 Eric Clapton box set retrospective Crossroads featured material from the abortive second album sessions. The Layla Sessions was a 1990 box set expanding that album across three CDs/cassettes. Live at the Fillmore (1994) offered an expanded version of the In Concert album.

Layla and Other Assorted Love Songs has been named one of the best albums of all time by VH1 (#89) and Rolling Stone (#115).

Members

Eric Clapton (guitar, songwriter and lead vocals)
Bobby Whitlock (keyboard, songwriter and lead vocals)
Carl Radle (bass guitar)
Jim Gordon (drums, piano on Layla)
Duane Allman (guitar)

Discography

Layla and Other Assorted Love Songs (1970, US #16)
In Concert (1973)
The Layla Sessions: 20th Anniversary Edition (1990)
Live at the Fillmore (1994)