Jack Bruce

Although some may be tempted to call multi-instrumentalist, songwriter, and composer Jack Bruce a rock & roll musician, blues and jazz were what this innovative musician really loved. As a result, those two genres were at the base of most of the recorded output from a career that went back to the beginning of London's blues scene in 1962. In that year, he joined <a href="spotify:artist:385tW2q0gMaQTkswc9lMSe">Alexis Korner's Blues Incorporated</a>. Throughout the following decades and into the 21st century, Bruce remained a supreme innovator, pushing himself into uncharted waters with his jazz and folk-rock compositions.

Bruce's most famous songs were, in essence, blues tunes -- "Sunshine of Your Love," "Strange Brew," "Politician," "White Room" -- and they were ones he penned for <a href="spotify:artist:74oJ4qxwOZvX6oSsu1DGnw">Cream</a>, the legendary blues-rock trio he formed with drummer <a href="spotify:artist:5xTbqEbkihxdjj2jyYSthw">Ginger Baker</a> and guitarist <a href="spotify:artist:6PAt558ZEZl0DmdXlnjMgD">Eric Clapton</a> in July 1966. <a href="spotify:artist:5xTbqEbkihxdjj2jyYSthw">Baker</a> and Bruce played together for five years before <a href="spotify:artist:6PAt558ZEZl0DmdXlnjMgD">Clapton</a> came along, and although their trio only lasted until November 1968, the group is credited with changing the face of rock & roll and bringing blues to a worldwide audience. Through their creative arrangements of classic blues tunes like <a href="spotify:artist:0f8MDDzIc6M4uH1xH0o0gy">Robert Johnson</a>'s "Crossroads," <a href="spotify:artist:2zlMeTjA7szCmqcJjBzYXJ">Skip James</a>' "I'm So Glad," <a href="spotify:artist:5v8WPpMk60cqZbuZLdXjKY">Willie Dixon</a>'s "Spoonful," and <a href="spotify:artist:5aygfDCEaX5KTZOxSCpT9o">Albert King</a>'s "Born Under a Bad Sign," the group helped popularize blues-rock and led the way for similar groups that came about later on, like <a href="spotify:artist:36QJpDe2go2KgaRleHCDTp">Led Zeppelin</a>.

Bruce was born May 14, 1943, in Lanarkshire, near Glasgow, Scotland. His father was a big jazz fan, and so he included people like <a href="spotify:artist:19eLuQmk9aCobbVDHc6eek">Louis Armstrong</a> and <a href="spotify:artist:0DYWCXTkNqGFZIf67SrWEa">Fats Waller</a> among his earliest influences. He grew up listening to jazz and took up bass and cello as a teen. After three months at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music, he left, disgusted with the politics of music school. After traveling around Europe for a while, he settled into the early blues scene in 1962 in London, where he eventually met drummer <a href="spotify:artist:5xTbqEbkihxdjj2jyYSthw">Ginger Baker</a>. He played with British blues pioneers <a href="spotify:artist:385tW2q0gMaQTkswc9lMSe">Alexis Korner</a> and <a href="spotify:artist:1im4Wcx1u8qxzbRtlRDbnC">Graham Bond</a> before leaving in 1965 to join <a href="spotify:artist:5s4z3mRAE7nxE3jjft8J3h">John Mayall's Bluesbreakers</a>, whose guitarist was <a href="spotify:artist:6PAt558ZEZl0DmdXlnjMgD">Eric Clapton</a>. This gave him time to get his chops together without having to practice. With Manfred Mann, who he also played with before forming <a href="spotify:artist:74oJ4qxwOZvX6oSsu1DGnw">Cream</a>, Bruce learned about the business of making hit songs.

<a href="spotify:artist:74oJ4qxwOZvX6oSsu1DGnw">Cream</a>'s reputation for long, extended blues jams began at the Fillmore in San Francisco at a concert organized by impresario Bill Graham. Bruce later realized that <a href="spotify:artist:74oJ4qxwOZvX6oSsu1DGnw">Cream</a> gave him a chance to succeed as a musician, and admitted that if it weren't for that group, he might never have escaped London. After <a href="spotify:artist:74oJ4qxwOZvX6oSsu1DGnw">Cream</a> split up in November 1968, Bruce formed Jack Bruce & Friends with drummer <a href="spotify:artist:5oDKuJduSZVqcOszqPs26t">Mitch Mitchell</a> and guitarist <a href="spotify:artist:25s8YpOLWqI2SgTlvapJyQ">Larry Coryell</a>. Recording-wise, Bruce took a different tack away from blues and blues-rock, leaning more in a folk-rock direction with his solo albums Songs for a Tailor (1969), Harmony Row (1971), and Out of the Storm (1974).

In 1970 and 1971, he worked with <a href="spotify:artist:1TW90GjShgkjySrxBxcwQe">Tony Williams Lifetime</a> before putting together another power trio with guitarist <a href="spotify:artist:0ks4E3VJXDIRABtxz2IiBE">Leslie West</a> and drummer <a href="spotify:artist:1luMfZzXgQ3AkGOHN3b4lQ">Corky Laing</a> in 1972, simply called <a href="spotify:artist:7AN8KaXC6UZ18IJzvkUW6i">West, Bruce & Laing</a>. After working with <a href="spotify:artist:6ra4GIOgCZQZMOaUECftGN">Frank Zappa</a> on his album Apostrophe in 1974, Bruce was at it again in 1975 with the Jack Bruce Band, whose members included keyboardist <a href="spotify:artist:4Byg6TGm4z9TEkUDvEJBGO">Carla Bley</a> and guitarist <a href="spotify:artist:4tkgLX1wdWoOu2lyeQNYAi">Mick Taylor</a>. Back on the road in 1980 with Jack Bruce & Friends, the latter version of the group included drummer <a href="spotify:artist:0IwfuIL3gUJxjzUqY3wJ3j">Billy Cobham</a>, keyboardist <a href="spotify:artist:1la7s8SDhvl9GykUuG6hSE">David Sancious</a>, and guitarist Clem Clempson, formerly of <a href="spotify:artist:2CxLP749mup3ncPrXgCnvU">Humble Pie</a>. In the early '80s, he formed another trio, B.L.T., this time with guitarist <a href="spotify:artist:0MAvx5yzdhylg2ztJC3MD3">Robin Trower</a>, before working with <a href="spotify:artist:5DHf2YUKRha33AnBFDXcqg">Kip Hanrahan</a> on his three solo albums. Bruce's bluesiest albums include all of his work with <a href="spotify:artist:74oJ4qxwOZvX6oSsu1DGnw">Cream</a>, the albums B.L.T. and Truce with <a href="spotify:artist:0MAvx5yzdhylg2ztJC3MD3">Trower</a>, some of his <a href="spotify:artist:7AN8KaXC6UZ18IJzvkUW6i">West, Bruce & Laing</a> recordings, and several of his albums from the 1980s and early '90s. These include Willpower (<a href="spotify:search:label%3A%22PolyGram%22">PolyGram</a>, 1989); A Question of Time (<a href="spotify:search:label%3A%22Epic+Records%22">Epic Records</a>, 1989), which includes guest performances by <a href="spotify:artist:1uFixbBAduJkFAeRKznkvW">Albert Collins</a>, <a href="spotify:artist:4oFSDUi4VgAWAn7t5RNaan">Nicky Hopkins</a>, and <a href="spotify:artist:5xTbqEbkihxdjj2jyYSthw">Baker</a>; as well as his <a href="spotify:search:label%3A%22CMP+Records%22">CMP Records</a>' live career-retrospective album recorded in Cologne, Germany, Cities of the Heart (1993).

Bruce released Monkjack in 1995, an album of his jazz piano compositions that he performed with organist <a href="spotify:artist:3vB7T6czx1Jh89YEnzM0UF">Bernie Worrell</a>, issued on <a href="spotify:search:label%3A%22CMP%22">CMP</a>. Bruce recorded the fierce Shadows in the Air in 2001 with a new band called the Cuicoland Express that included <a href="spotify:artist:1nCiDbYWnN9G4VQ4LxeyxD">Vernon Reid</a>, <a href="spotify:artist:3vB7T6czx1Jh89YEnzM0UF">Worrell</a>, and <a href="spotify:artist:2EWLNYbiWAIEl2MDfE3nCj">Robby Ameen</a>, and guest artists <a href="spotify:artist:6PAt558ZEZl0DmdXlnjMgD">Eric Clapton</a> and <a href="spotify:artist:320TrJub4arztwXRm7kqVO">Dr. John</a> for the <a href="spotify:search:label%3A%22CMC+International%2FSanctuary%22">CMC International/Sanctuary</a> imprint. Bruce reunited with <a href="spotify:artist:0MAvx5yzdhylg2ztJC3MD3">Robin Trower</a> for 2008's Seven Moons, released on <a href="spotify:search:label%3A%22Evangeline+Records%22">Evangeline Records</a>, following it with Seven Moons Live a year later in 2009.

In 2010, Bruce joined the Tony Williams Lifetime Tribute Band with <a href="spotify:artist:1nCiDbYWnN9G4VQ4LxeyxD">Reid</a>, organist <a href="spotify:artist:46IQ7Q0jkW6dW0l4e15FFD">John Medeski</a>, and drummer Cindy Blackman, and toured in the late part of that year and in early 2011 to sold-out performances and rave reviews. Also in 2011, <a href="spotify:search:label%3A%22Pledge+Music%22">Pledge Music</a>, a company that pairs fans and artists to fund projects, released Jack Bruce and the Cuicoland Express Live at the Milky Way, from a 2001 concert in Amsterdam. The high-quality recording was provided by Bruce's daughters, who designed the cover as well. The Lifetime Tribute Band's tour had been so successful that the group renamed itself <a href="spotify:artist:2inutgFIUuve22dgS3EKE8">Spectrum Road</a> and entered the studio. They emerged with a self-titled album that featured covers of <a href="spotify:artist:056ewKKC7ayMJeL7y5h2cb">Lifetime</a> material and originals. In 2013, Bruce reconvened the rhythm section under his name for the album Silver Rails (with <a href="spotify:artist:0MAvx5yzdhylg2ztJC3MD3">Robin Trower</a>, <a href="spotify:artist:48NRGRV9MmSBScnKTLztSt">Phil Manzanera</a>, <a href="spotify:artist:2VoP4JXyxNPIoYAFdB5ssQ">Uli Jon Roth</a>, and <a href="spotify:artist:677DC3rdbnijHQV1dg4j6c">Bernie Marsden</a> alternating in the guitar chair). It was released in March of 2014. Just seven months later, however, he died at his Suffolk home from liver disease. ~ Richard Skelly, Rovi