Journey guitarist explains how he almost joined Derek and the Dominos
By Peter Lindblad
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| Neal Schon 2012 |
In the position he was in, it’s hard to imagine Neal Schon
refusing an offer to play with Eric Clapton.
A mere teenager, whose soulful, expressive guitar playing
had caught the ear of the man known as “Slowhand,” Schon had dropped out of
high school in the 1960s to follow his musical muse. This was the chance of a
lifetime. Other guitarists would have given their eye teeth for such an
opportunity, but fate had something different in mind for Schon.
“I had a good feeling … I don’t know why, but I had a good
feeling I was going to be asked to join the Santana band, because I’d been hanging
out with them,” remembers Schon. “I believe I started hanging out with [keyboardist]
Gregg Rolie two to three months before I actually got in the band. And him and
I would just hang and he’d play acoustic piano, and I’d play some quiet
electric guitar and we’d jam. He began picking me up at high school, which I
was really not into, and we’d take off and I’d cut school and we’d jam. And
then we started hanging out and playing in clubs, and all of a sudden, we were
working in a studio. And we’d work out in the studio 24/7 and just go in there
and jam and try come up with song ideas.”
On one particular night, while the two were jamming “on some
stuff that sounded like ‘Batuka’ on the third [Santana] record, and that was
the beginning stages of that song, I believe,” Schon recalls Clapton walking
through the door. “My jaw dropped. This was just incredible. And I was so
shocked at the time I really think I just said, ‘Hello’ and ‘goodbye’ to the
guy,” says Schon.
Clapton soon joined in, trading off solos with Schon. They
recorded and played for a couple of hours before Clapton left. “And he said, ‘It
was great seeing you guys. I’ve got a gig tomorrow.’ And he took off, so it was
wild and that was it,” says Schon.
A dumbstruck Schon couldn’t believe what had happened, and
he certainly didn’t think anything more would come of it.
“And then the next day, I come into the studio, and there
was a note left there from him to me inviting me to play with him and Derek and
the Dominos at Berkeley Community Theatre,” relates Schon, who knew Clapton’s
catalog backwards and forwards. “And so, at the time, I didn’t have a license.
I got somebody to drive me over there, and I managed to get there about 10
minutes before they went onstage. And I went backstage, and he says, ‘Oh,
great. You got here.’ He says, ‘We’re going to go onstage and I’m going to play
about seven or eight tunes, and then I’m going to call you up as a good friend,
and you’re just going to sit in and jam with us for the whole rest of the
night.’ And I said, ‘Great.’ I brought a guitar, and he brought me up onstage
and I just went and plugged in, and his guitar tech turned the amp up to 10,
and we were off.”
The night didn’t end there.
“It was really fun to play and then afterwards, he invited
me to go to the hotel with him,” says Schon. “He wanted to sit down and talk,
so I went and as we were talking, he was asking who I listened to, and I told
him, 'Him.' And he didn’t believe me, so I picked up an acoustic guitar and I
started playing note for note ‘Crossroads’ off the Wheels of Fire record. He was like, ‘Wow!’ And he gave me a really
kind compliment, and at that point, he said, ‘Well, would you be interested in
moving to England and coming and playing with me?’ And I was just like,
‘Whoa.’”
Caught completely off guard by the proposal, Schon wasn’t
prepared to answer, “Yes,” even though he could be forgiven for accepting it on
the spot.
“I had just barely moved out of my folks’ apartment and was
hanging out with Gregg in Mill Valley, in Marin County, north of San
Francisco,” says Schon. “And man, I said, ‘I don’t think I’m ready to move to
England, although I’d love to play with you.’”
To some extent, Schon felt an obligation to the members of
Santana. He’d spent about a month in the studio with them, and Schon had an
inkling he’d be asked to join Santana. Fortunately, he was right.
“I also felt that Derek and the Dominos were not going to
last that long,” says Schon. “It just appeared that there were some issues
going on in the band that I could sense, much like an animal, you know
(laughs). It was not like the best time period.”
His prediction was eerily accurate, as Derek and the
Dominos, racked by drug abuse and other vices, barely held it together between
1970 and 1971, recording the album Layla
and Other Assorted Love Songs before the whole thing disintegrated –
although a live album, In Concert,
would be released in 1973.
Meanwhile, Schon did eventually land with Santana, joining
the band in 1971, just in time to lend his talents to the Santana III album, helping the band forge a tougher, more
rock-oriented sound.
“We were really
quick in the studio, everybody played live, and there were a few solos that
were overdubbed,” recalls Schon. “And I usually got ‘em in one take. I remember
we were in and out, and it was a great experience. Great record – I love it to
this day.
What people may not know is who actually played lead guitar
on one of the LP’s biggest hits, “Everybody’s Everything,” which featured horns
by Tower of Power. “I actually played lead guitar on it. And Carlos played
rhythm guitar and bass on that,” says Schon.
Ironically, Schon’s association with Santana was also
short-lived.
“Well, during the duration that I played with the band,
there were people coming and going,” admits Schon. “There were a lot of
fall-outs happening. There were a lot of drug issues, and everybody was into a
different thing. It got a little crazy and intense, and people were getting
pissed and they’d take off and then someone would be replaced for a second.”
Even though the end was near for Schon, he did contribute to
Caravanserai , an album he still
loves. “’Song of the Wind’ is amazing on that, which is a song Carlos and I
just winged, and I actually play the first solo on that; he played the middle
solo and I played the last solo on that, and you know, it’s two chords, and we
just improvised and played.” And that’s what Schon’s been doing his whole life,
as he proves on his latest solo album, The
Calling, out now on Frontiers Records.
Schon collaborated with former Journey band mate Steve Smith
on the record, and to Smith, it was sort of like being back in Journey ... with some glaring differences.
“Working with Neal on The Calling was very similar to how we
worked together with Journey,” said Smith. “We have an easy rapport, a creative
chemistry and get right to the task at hand. The atmosphere is fun and we are
excited about the music that we are creating. There were two main differences:
With Journey we did the writing and rehearsing well before the recording of the
album. That way by the time we got to the studio, we knew what we would be
recording. With The Calling, Neal had four songs prepared when I arrived at
Fantasy Studios. After I recorded those songs on the first day of recording we
spent three more days coming up with ideas for tunes and recording them as we
went, so the process moved much faster than a Journey recording. The other
difference was that the team was not the five Journey band members, who would
contribute ideas to the songwriting, arranging and recording process. The team
was Neal, keyboard player Igor Len and me. Of course, The Calling is Neal’s
album, so he took the lead and did most of the writing and arranging with Igor
and I assisting with ideas and direction when needed. Neal is a prolific writer
and every time he picks up a guitar, he’ll come up with some new ideas.”
And that’s something Clapton and Derek and the Dominos never
got the chance to see up close.
