Bercy, Paris, France
6th April 2004


Review by : DSP

The room: The Palace Omnisport of Paris Bercy is well-known amateurs of sport or music. The room is well, with the proviso of not being too far. Small flat: One is not inevitably at ease on the places which are a little hard. I was very well placed: on the left in the block nearest to the scene to the 5th row. I.e. that I was almost with height of the battery.

First Part: The first part started at 20h, "Robert Randolph & The Family Band". The set was still very short, hardly 35mn. But that was still very extremely. Public, much the more dynamic than in Cournon, particularly applauded. We had must with superb a medley Voodoo Chile/Purple Haze.

The Show : The show started with 21h. The provision of the musicians was the same one as in Cournon. Eric was equipped with a white shirt, a blue Jean and a beige pair of shoes clearly.
He started with "Let It Rain", followed of "Hoochie Coochie Man" and "Bell Bottom Blues". Fortunately, Doyle Bramhall was less calamitous than in Cournon (Ouf!!!), even very well. There was little error and its solos were rather well inspired. But that did not prevent that the public one felt a little coldness, a lack of spontaneous ness in this beginning in concert. Really damage!!! "Walk Out In The Rain" passed to the trap door. I really regretted it, the new version of this old song largely deserved to be more often played.
The concert really awoke with "I Shot The Sheriff" with the first great solo of the evening (Excellent!). Then, it connected with the titles of the new album "Milkcow's Calf Blues" (with the bottleneck with its black Stratocaster), "When You Got A Good Friend" (superb applauded solo!), "They're Red Hot" (with Gibson L5) and "Kind Hearted Woman Blues" (still a very good solo blues, with an excellent reaction of public). It should be noted that the title "Hellhound On My Trail" which was played at the beginning of the tour was removed.

One of the tops of the evening was "Got To Get A Better In A Little While". One don't understand why this track remained so a long time in a wall cupboard. It connected with "I Want A Little Girl" and "Change The World". On this last title, it made a curious thing: towards the 2/3 of the title, when that accelerates, it changed its black acoustic Martin against his electric guitar. This change revitalized the title to also enable him to pass more easily to the explosive "Have You Ever Loved A Woman?". On this blues, all the solos were superb. Everyone was very inspired. A good point has Doyle Bramhall which made us a so good solo that Eric asked him to continue. It was applauded by public however rather difficult out of guitar. Billy Preston also made us a solo with extension with the really excellent organ!!! In short, for me, this title was the top of the evening with a cohesion and a perfect inspiration of the group.

After the impossible to circumvent ones came: "Badge", "Wonderful Tonight", "Cocaine" and "Layla". Nothing which breaks the hut, I will speak rather about formality....... Small funny detail, lasting "Layla", as usual, at the end of its solo, it takes again the gimmick several times to pass to the passage piano. At Bercy, Eric misses a gimmick, that the so surprised one that that made smile.

Well on, there was the encore. Contrary to Cournon, it begins "Sunshine Of Your Love" with a presentation of the musicians. Well on the public one was conquered, and each one was very applauded!! The small surprise was, at the end of the 3rd verse, when one arrives on final length, it's Robert Randolph who joined them on scene. It is more than obvious that Eric has much pleasure of playing with him. The proof, it in offered to us of beautiful duel of solos, very good and dynamics. There were other duels on the 2nd track of the encore: "I Got My Mojo Working". It was fantastic, Eric passed half of the song to smiling. Especially when Robert made us small notes with the wha-wha during his song.

In short: A super concert with solos incredible and inspired, as well as the obviousness that Eric has much pleasure with this group. End in the concert towards 22h50. It's noted that Clapton used only its Crash landing-3 (A Cournon the Crash landing-1 had been used on several titles)


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