Today (May 2, 2025) marks the 20th anniversary of the start of Cream’s historic four-show reunion engagement at the famed Royal Albert Hall in London. The 2005 concert was the first full public performance by the legendary British power trio of Eric Clapton (guitar/vocals), Jack Bruce (bass/vocals), and Ginger Baker (drums) since the band’s farewell show at the Royal Albert Hall on November 26, 1968.
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The only other time Clapton, Bruce, and Baker had reunited to perform since 1968 was when Cream was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall at a ceremony in Los Angeles in in January 1993.
[RELATED: Behind the Early and Quick Demise of Eric Clapton’s Supergroup Cream]
The May 2, 2005, show featured a 19-song set that offered a mix of originals and blues covers mainly from the first three of the band’s four albums—Fresh Cream (1966), Disraeli Gears (1967), and Wheels of Fire (1968).
The concert included performances of three songs Cream had never played live before. The first was “Pressed Rat and Warthog,” a song co-written by Baker that first appeared on Wheels of Fire. The second was “Badge,” a U.K. hit that Clapton co-wrote with George Harrison and that was featured on Cream’s fourth and final album, Goodbye (1969). The third tune was a cover of the 1947 T-Bone Walker blues classic “Stormy Monday,” which Cream never recorded.
Among the classic Cream songs performed at the show were the band interpretations of the blues tunes “I’m So Glad,” “Born Under a Bad Sign,” and “Crossroads,” and the originals “Politician,” “White Room,” and “Sunshine of Your Love.”
Cream’s History Leading Up to the Reunion
All three Cream members were virtuoso musicians, and the band’s inventive blend of blues and psychedelic rock influenced countless hard-rock acts that followed in their wake. The group seemed always doomed to brief existence, though, thanks to the extremely contentious relationship between Baker and Bruce.
The two musicians’ vitriol dated to when they both played in the pre-Cream blues/jazz outfit the Graham Bond Organization. Baker apparently felt that Bruce played too loud and too busily, and either was asked by Bond or took it upon himself to fire Bruce.
Whatever their differences, Bruce and Baker tolerated each other enough to create some timeless music during Cream’s original two-year existence.
Baker and Clapton About Cream’s Decision to Reunite
Fast-forward to 2005, Clapton, Baker, and Bruce all discussed their feelings positive feelings about reuniting in some interviews filmed around the time of the Royal Albert Hall shows.
Baker noted that the reunion was Clapton’s idea, and he wasn’t initially keen on doing it.
“Then Eric phoned me up and convinced me to do it,” Ginger shared, “and I’m very glad he did, because I was a bit wary about it, and I’m more than pleasantly surprised. I’m really thoroughly enjoying it, and I think the band’s better than it’s ever been.”
Clapton then explained in detail what prompted him to push for the reunion.
“I think over the years, I’d started to wonder what it’d be like,” he said. “And it was the kind of first question most people would ask. Just you in our normal conversations I’d have with people about music, eventually people would ask me if I would ever consider reforming Cream, as if it was my responsibility. … And, you know, initially I was really reluctant and … actually was tired of the question.”
Eric continued, “And then it started to kind of grow in my own mind as ‘Why not?’ And I think what made it more and more feasible was the fact that we could do it. [A]nd the more time that went past, that became an issue in itself, because so many bands who would probably like to have done that have lost members … or [are] just incompatible.
He added, “[W]e are one of the few groups from that period who can honestly say that we can get back together again and do exactly almost what we did then. And I thought, ‘Well, if that’s the case, we would be really kind of crazy not to.’”
Bruce Explained Why He Was Excited About Reuniting with Cream
Bruce, meanwhile, said that in reuniting with Clapton and Baker, Cream wasn’t just rehashing its past glories.
“I don’t think of it as a nostalgic thing at all,” he maintained. “I might have thought that, but once we started playing, to me it all sounded quite new and fresh. It sounded … like us now, if you know what I mean, and not us then.”
Jack continued, “We could have got up with Marshall [amplifier] stacks and sort of the old EB3 bass I used to use and stuff like that, but we tried it a little bit at the rehearsals but it didn’t work. We didn’t like it, so we’re just playing the way we play now … and I loved it. I thought, musically, it was quite valid, and people liked it as well. There’s a certain amount of nostalgia, of course, but that was the least of it, I thought.”
More About the Cream Reunion
Cream’s three reunion concerts at the Royal Albert Hall took place on May 3, May 5, and May 6, 2005. The shows were filmed and recorded for an album and concert video that were released in October of 2005. No performances from the May 2 show were included in the releases.
Also in October 2005, Cream played three more reunion concerts at Madison Square Garden on New York City. The shows took place on October 24, 25, and 26. The October 26 concert was the last performance ever by Cream.
Bruce died in October 2014 from liver cancer at the age of 71. Baker passed away in October 2019 from complications of COPD. He was 80.
Cream Reunion Concert Set List, Royal Albert Hall, London, U.K., 5/2/2005:
- “I’m So Glad”
- “Spoonful”
- “Outside Woman Blues”
- “Pressed Rat and Warthog”
- “Sleepy Time Time”
- “N.S.U.”
- “Badge”
- “Politician”
- “Sweet Wine”
- “Rollin’ and Tumblin’”
- “Stormy Monday”
- “Deserted Cities of the Heart”
- “Born Under a Bad Sign”
- “We’re Going Wrong”
- “Crossroads”
- “Sitting on Top of the World”
- “White Room”
- “Toad”
Encore:
- “Sunshine of Your Love”
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