The cover of
Eric Clapton's 2002 live album
One More Car, One More Rider -- no less than the sixth live album in his solo career -- suggests the problems in the record. It's designed to look a classic
blues album sleeve or poster, but it's self-conscious and affected, the work of somebody that knows the form but not the substance of the
blues. Certainly that accusation can't be reasonably leveled at
Clapton who, after all, has proved throughout his career that he knows the substance of the
blues, but ever since his canonization to the MOR mainstream with 1992's
Unplugged, there's a sinking feeling that
EC dabbles in the
blues instead of lives there. Sure, he had a fierce testimonial to his favorite music with
From the Cradle, but
One More Car, One More Rider arrives nearly a decade later, and the difference is stunning. Though he goes through the motions of playing the
blues -- a cutting version of the perennial
"Key to the Highway," "Hoochie Coochie Man," "Goin' Down Slow," among others here -- the heart of this album is closer to the
NPR instrumental jam of
"Reptile" than
blues. This is mannered, "classy" playing which sounds perfectly fine but is never interesting, particularly since the song selection favors either warhorses or recent hits. In short, it's a record for those that like the idea of
Clapton more than his music. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine
![Sabotage [LP]](http://prodimage.images-bn.com/pimages/0081227946562_p0_v2_s90x140.jpg "Sabotage [LP]")
