J.J. Cale has basically made 1 record in his life, with three types of songs:
- easy going, bluesy, country&western-style, mid-tempo songs with a simple yet catchy riff
- easy going, bluesy, country&western-style, up-tempo songs with a simple yet catchy riff
- easy going, mid-tempo ballads.
Sometimes there lurks a little horn section in there, sometimes, there is a slight Caribbean flavour, but that’s about it. Of course he made a lot of money because other people covered some of his songs. Eric Clapton is the most famous (and therefore the most rewarding one, to J.J., financially), with both After Midnight and Cocaine (and others but they did not become hits or staples of his life shows. In many interviews Eric has voiced his admiration for J.J., as a song writer and as a person who steered cleeart of the music business and just lived his life. In fact he styled some of his albums after J.J.s example (Backless, Slowhand, Reptile, among others).
It’s fun then, to see and hear them make a record together that’s basically a J.J. Cale album with his vocals double tracked. Oh no, wait, that’s Eric! They are more or less interchangeable anyway. Best songs in my opinion are Danger (nice vibe, great cymbal drumming), Missing Person (funky piano) and Ride the river (as driving or pulsating as acoustic guitar songs can be). Anyway the wind blows is great (actually a cover from another J.J,. Cale album (Okie, 1974. Another song, Don’t cry sister cry is taken from his 1979 album, called 5). All in all, having Eric on board may have helped sales but did not drastically change the sound. To the types of songs J.J. plays I mentioned above can be added “sometimes as a duet’”.