Editorial Review
After years of admiring each other's musical masterworks, guitar great J.J. Cale and Rock and Roll Hall of Famer/Grammy-winner Eric Clapton have teamed up to create an original album together called The Road to Escondido. The resulting hybrid sound defies labels, and instead finds influence across the spectrum of blues, rock, country, and fold. The songs are warm and rich with deep-flowing rhythms while using an economy of words to express much.
Eric Clapton Merchandise
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Customer Reviews
Do it again! 
2008-05-03
It's not often that the first time I listen to a recording I love it instantly, but that's what happened when I heard The Road to Escondido. There really isn't anything not to like about this recording. The songs, music, and the way that Clapton and J.J. Cale harmonize is just amazing. My only hope is that they do this again and release another recording together.
I believe that their ride to Escondido is in an old Cadillac traveling at 20mph in the fast lane with their blinker on 
2008-01-23
After years of honoring each other's work, most notably Clapton covering Cale's "After Midnight" and "Cocaine," the two blues guitar greats team up to create a fresh album together. The result is true to both legends' blues roots, but unfortunately lacks any energy or punch to make any of the songs interesting. I don't know if it's because they're getting on in years or they forgot how to kick it up a notch, but somehow I believe that their ride to Escondido is in an old Cadillac traveling at 20mph in the fast lane with their blinker on.
Escondido, Perfect Combination 2008-01-22
Perfect comination of British and American blues. The song Ride the River is one of the ten best songs ever written and performed. If you like to drive to music, you'll want to take this CD always. Highly recomended.
good music 
2008-01-13
This is a good sound. We are enjoying it as we ride our H.D. around this USA!
The Road to Escondido 2007-12-13
This is phoenominal. What other adjectives can you think of to describe this? All the cliches you can think of still won't fully elaborate how good this is.
Different But Excellent 
2007-11-29
After years of admiring each other's musical masterworks, guitar great J.J. Cale and Rock and Roll Hall of Famer/Grammy-winner Eric Clapton have teamed up to create an original album together called The Road to Escondido. The resulting hybrid sound defies labels, and instead finds influence across the spectrum of blues, rock, country, and fold. The songs are warm and rich with deep-flowing rhythms while using an economy of words to express much.
Eric Clapton Merchandise
There's a great 2007-11-16
vinyl-length album in here. Put Danger, Heads In Georgia, Sporting Life Blues, Dead End Road, Hard To Thrill, Anyway The Wind Blows, Three Little Girls, Don't Cry Sister, Who Am I Telling You, and Ride The River in your iPod, and you have EC's best album at least since Riding With The King. The other four tracks just aren't as good, and would likely have been the outtakes in the days of the elpee. (Then we'd be clamoring for them as extra tracks on a reissue or something.)
His best since Riding With The King, I says, and I don't think it's any coincidence that Riding, too, was a co-headliner gig, a collaboration with one of Clapton's big influences. Cale's presence, and his songs, seem to have inspired Clapton just like B.B.'s did, and the result is just as good, although it walks the Tulsa side of EC's territory rather than the Delta side.
The difference isn't just stylistic, though. On Riding, Clapton's and King's voices were so different, and their guitar styles so distinct (surprising, given how much Clapton got from King's style), that it was always clear who was contributing what. Here, not only are there seven credited guitarists, most of whom Clapton could be mistaken for, but Cale's and Clapton's voices sound so similar, and are mixed so close together, that it's genuinely difficult to tell who's singing at times. They sound like brothers, or alter-egos. Appropriate, although disconcerting at times.
As with most post-Cream EC efforts, if you're listening just for guitar fireworks you're going to be a little disappointed. They're here, but the most memorable guitar lines belong (I *think* - I wish every Clapton release came with a track chart like the ones in the Layla box) to Derek Trucks on "Anyway The Wind Blows." It has that sinuous, luminescent Allmans sound. But Clapton gets his licks in, too, as do Cale, Bramhall, and everybody else. Dig the successive guitar statements in Danger: I don't know who's playing what, but it's all sweet as honey.
Mostly what you get, though, is really in-the-pocket, comfortable playing. The band(s) just hit the sweet spot. It's country soul music, in spirit not too terribly far from that Cosmic American Music Gram Parsons talked about: a little blues, a little country, a little western, a little pop, a little rock, a little gospel. You can tell this the kind of thing EC's been chasing, off and on, since the early '70s; this time he really nails it.
I say band(s): the musician credits take up a whole page, so there's really no way to know what combination of players is on any given track. What can be identified deserves special mention, though: Billy Preston providing Hammond licks just as tasty as ever (some of his last, RIP); John Mayer more than holding his own on his co-written Hard To Thrill; and that fiddle player on Dead End Road, fulfilling all the country promise made by the empty Vince Gill collaboration on Back Home.
If you're really into EC's revisitation of his Tulsa fling, it's worth noting that he contributed a song in this vain (Positively) to Jamie Oldaker's Mad Dogs & Okies album, and a duet with Tony Joe White on Did Somebody Make A Fool Out Of You on White's album Uncovered, both in 2006. Neither are quite as strong as what's here, though.
Cale Takes The Lead 2007-10-27
An excellent collaboration, with Clapton not so much the constant front man, as most all songs are written by Cale and is more his style than the sometimes pop style Clapton gets messed up with when left to his own devices.
Great Combination! 2007-10-11
The mixing of J.J. Cale's (featured more than Clapton, and wrote most of the songs) laid back, folksy-bluesy style added to Clapton's tasty guitar work, along with his laid back, bluesy style (on this CD), makes for an incredible CD, an incredible mix, a beautiful blend. Even the two voices seem to fit beautifully. And it's about time the two got together, as J.J. Cale wrote the early Clapton hits "After Midnight" and "Cocaine." The best J.J. Cale (not to be confused with John Cale) CD I've heard. Highly recommended.
Road to Escondido 2007-09-14
This is a great album for JJ Cale & Clapton fans. I found it a little too 'country' for ne but still a great album.
