Unlike many musicians of his generation, Eric Clapton has remained interested in younger generations of guitarists and has praised several younger players in recent years. Rock and Roll Garage selected two of them and what Eric said about their playing.
2 younger guitarists that Eric Clapton said he is a fan of
Mk.gee
The first is Mk.gee, an American guitarist and singer born in 1996, whom Eric described as a unique musician who had discovered new possibilities in guitar playing. “Mk.gee kinda sits in a bit of a pop category for me. Right. But it’s unique. And he has found things to do on the guitar that are like nobody else. I think he goes into – I used to have one of these things – a Tascam? It’s a four-track recording cassette machine. He uses that as a preamp.”
“My daughter turned me on (to Mk.gee) today, and I trust her taste. And not only that, we’re (speaking about the music industry and guitar scene) safe. The same when I first saw Prince, it was like we’re safe. Just to know it’s there (musicians like Mk.gee) is enough,” Eric Clapton said in an interview with The Real Music Observer. The young musician has previously mentioned Eric as an inspiration because he was a guitarist who took the guitar and didn’t play it exactly as it was supposed to be played.
He said:
“Eric Clapton, Jimi… more artists on the side of people who have shifted musical trends. People that take these instruments and don’t play them how the instruments are supposed to be played.” “I was really drawn to that but I didn’t know why at the time. I just knew I really liked it. Especially with Jimi’s playing, which really changed the game.
He didn’t play like any conventional guitarists from the ‘60s and ‘70s. Deep Purple and all that classic rock stuff, too,” Mk.gee said. Besides being a singer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Mk.gee is also a producer. He already released two EPs and his first studio album was “Two Star & The Dream Police” (2004). His most popular songs are “Are You Looking Up”, “How Many Miles” and “Alesis”.
Blake Mills
The second is Blake Mills, who is a little older and was born in the United States in 1986. In 2016, Clapton described him as the “premier musician” of the time. “Well, there’s a guy called Blake Mills out there who’s dabbling in all kinds of stuff. He is, for me, the premier musician in that field right now. He doesn’t play blues for a living; he does a bit of film work and has made a couple of albums. But he’s one of the finest slide players I’ve ever heard. It’s nice to know that someone is still moving in that direction,” he said in an interview with Guitar World.
The British guitarist had already praised Mills two years before, saying he was phenomenal. “(I listen to Rock) occasionally. I don’t know what Rock is now. I’m not sure who’s playing Rock. Blake Mills is the last guitarist I heard that I thought was phenomenal,” he told Rolling Stone.
Mills was once asked how he felt when he discovered that Clapton had praised his playing. He said he was happy, especially because he felt that, like him, Eric was still searching for something new in guitar playing that he hadn’t heard or discovered before. “I’m fascinated by his enthusiasm. He’s always been somebody that I’ve witnessed is searching for something new. He’s interested in something that he hasn’t heard before.”
He continued:
“I really relate to that and respect that and know how rare that is and how easy it is to sit on the things you like and guard them and champion them. For him to have said something so generous was not expected but totally in line with the gentleman that he is and his character. I really appreciate it,” he said in an interview with Diffuser FM in 2014.
So far, Blake has released seven solo studio albums and worked as a guitarist and producer on albums by many famous artists. Some of them are Bob Dylan, Jack Johnson, John Legend, Beck, Bruce Hornsby, Fiona Apple and Alabama Shakes.