Disraeli Gears was the album that took the Cream to the limelight, but its successor Wheels of Fire, finds the trio with another great crafted album.
The trio was indeed born and blessed with incredible talent, and psychedelia, in which they turned Wheels of Fire as one of their masterpieces. The album consists of two of their best-known tracks such as “White Room” and their cover of Robert Johnson’s “Crossroads.” With these, they showed their most energetic and pulsive antics.
The album was recorded between July of 1967 and April 1968 at Atlantic Studios in New York and live at Winterland and Fillmore West, and they turned the record as their cornerstone album.
Cream was indeed great at many things, but songwriting and recording were not there strongest suits. However, they did always tend to do a fantastic job as performers and excels as musicians. Wheels of Fire, the two-record set, proves that they were a force of nature during those times.
Though the album has a great studio disc, it has also a downside, the deeply flawed live disc. The latter is trivial, but Crossroads was a classic and Spoonful is enjoyable, the second half of the album isn’t much something you could say tasteful. Impressive in terms of musicianship, but its nature can be judged as not a useful album. But it’s Cream, of course, the positive sides of the album indeed outweigh the negative.
Probably, if The Jimi Hendrix Experience weren’t recording the Electric Ladyland at that time, Wheels Of Fire would turn out fine, they were their biggest competition during that era.