Momomomoooorning Readers! Feeling energetiry today to work on Steemit - This time let's bring Mate and Music!

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Oh yeah baby! How would life be without music? I planned to bring something different this morning, but while doing my morning routines listening to music on the radio an idea struck me, I absolutely needed to make a fresh Mate and start writing about it - when enthusiasm about something hits you, go for it!

If you are curious and don't know what Mate is, I've written a post in the past about it:

Visiting Southern Brazil | Yerba-Mate | What is it, How to prepare & Benefits

I want to share with you today some vinyls I brought on a trip to London; bringing music to a travel related blog, couldn't be more amazing. The funny fact is that this monster who is writing doesn't have a vinyl player to listen to those awesome records, D'oh.

This post is inspired by my friend @rossfletcher, @guchtere and @riverflows, who are passionate about music and sharing their marvelous vinyls; also to my friend @veckinon who is a great musician. Enjoy!

^{Steemit; Mate; Music!}

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London, for me is the meca. I went there in 2013, a trip that I'll tell you on the following posts about Europe. That being said, I have to admit that I'm a 60's lover and, at the time of that trip, I was not only listening to old blues and 60's music, but I used to dress like a 60's young guy - high heel boots, square tip tie, white shirt, black jeans. Today, I still listen to the music, but the drinking hard and playing guitar aspect of life is gone, one day one gotta live healthy. Anyway...

I don't remember exactly where, but one day we visited a neighborhood where they have tons of second-hand vinyls for sale. It was inside one of those stores that I completely burried myself into the depths of music. Three floors of vinyls! The basement dedicated to 'general' had unlabeled vinyls of any kind, all for a fixed price; it's unlikely, but you could find a rare vinyl there in the middle of that mess. The other floors were labeled and divided by style varying from fazz to heavy metal. I remember seeing 60's The Beatles records, originals and still on it's sealed plastic, needless to say that they would cost you a arm and a leg to purchase.

On that amazing store I bought, very cheap, some vinyls that are rare and expensive in Brazil. I was so amazed checking all the records that, at some point, Mom got fed up and wanted to go. What did I get? A bunch of different labels, but for now I'll only show you the Cream ones.

Cream Vinyl Collection

Below is the most classic Cream song, so you can listen while reading this post!

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Cream is undoubtedly my favourite band, you may have noticed it on this post. When I first listened to Cream, it felt like a bomb in my mind. How the heck can Clapton play like that? - I thought.

The powerful trio with Clapton on the guitar, Ginger Baker on drums and Jack Bruce on bass/vocals had such a strong blues/jazz/improvisation aproach to music that it is impossible to replicate their live shows - every show used to be different from the previous one. I burried myself as a guitar player trying to understand what was happening on those chords and solos, I so bad wanted to play as strong as that, but of course I couldn't, which until this day frustrates me. It was funny though, seeing my band mates' face when I turned the amplifier all the way up to 10 on volume, trying to bring that sweet natural guitar sustain.

My Cream collection is missing the last record, Goodbye Cream, this itself justifies another visit to London. Maybe in the near future. Here are the ones I bought.

Fresh Cream - The First Album

^{Fresh Cream - This photos is my own.}

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Fresh Cream is the debut studio album by the British rock band Cream. The album was released in the UK on 9 December 1966, as the first LP on the Reaction Records label, owned by producer Robert Stigwood. The UK album was released in both mono and stereo versions, at the same time as the release of the single "I Feel Free". Source: Wikipedia

For me, on this album Eric Clapton still conserves his John Mayal and the Blues Breaker guitar tone which consisted of a Gibson Les Paul plugged straight into a Marshall amp. The raw power is just way too perfect to be real. My favourite song on Fresh Cream is I'm So Glad, which was the theme song on my graduation party.

Disraeli Gears - The Second Album

^{Disraeli Gears - This photos is my own.}

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Disraeli Gears is the second studio album by the British rock band Cream. It was released in November 1967 and went on to reach No. 5 on the UK Albums Chart. It was also the group's American breakthrough, becoming a massive seller in 1968, and reaching No. 4 on the American charts. The album was No. 1 for two weeks on the Australian album chart and was listed as the No. 1 album of 1968 by Cash Box in the year-end album chart in the United States. The album features the two singles "Strange Brew" and "Sunshine of Your Love". Source: Wikipedia.

On this album the magic started, so many different tones and experimentations with the new Wah-Wah pedal completely blew my mind. If you are a guitar player you may know about the famous 'Woman Tone', very well used on Sunshine of Your Love and many other songs. Described my Clapton himself, the woman tone consisted of a tonal variation where you turn off the tone controls on the guitar all the way down to zero and the volume full up, that creates a sound tha resembles a woman voice. It's beautiful. Another fun fact about this record is its name; it's said that it was created after one of the band's roadies mispelled the word 'Derailleur Gear', which is a bicycle's part.

Wheels of Fire - The First Album

^{Wheels of Fire - This photos is my own.}

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Wheels of Fire is the third album by the British rock band Cream. It was released in August 1968 as a two-disc vinyl LP, with one disc recorded in the studio and the other recorded live. It reached number three in the United Kingdom and number one in the United States, becoming the world's first platinum-selling double album. In May 2012, Rolling Stone magazine ranked it number 205 on its list of the 500 greatest albums of all time. Source: Wikipedia

This is the last on my collection, it's impossible not to be impressed by the power of Ginger Baker's drumming on songs like White Room, beating the double bass drum like a mad man. I also love the horns on Pressed Rat and Warthog.

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If you are a guitar nuts and lover of improvasation you should definately check Cream, it surprises me the amount of friends that claim to be rock and blues fans, but have never heard of this master piece. If you really want to dig into it, a search for their Bootlegs on YouTube will surprise you even more, making you a frustrated guitar player for life.

The following posts will start my European series, where the first stop was exactly London, I'll give you my impressions and how I felt going through those magical strees. Thanks for reading!

This is the 60's me!

^{This is me pretending to be a 60's guy!}

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Let's spread music all over Steemit! Please share down below your favourite vinyls if you have any, I'd love to know.

If you liked this post, please, consider leaving your upvote for a hot coffee.

~Love ya all,

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Disclaimer:  The author of this post is a convict broke backpacker, who has travelled more than 10.000 km hitchhiking. Following him may cause severe problems of wanderlust and inquietud. You've been warned.

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I'm Arthur. I blog about Adventure Stories, Brazil, Travel, Camping & Life Experiences.

Follow me to stay tuned for more craziness and tips.

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