This name - Eric Burdon - is known to every music lover. The musician left a considerable mark in history, becoming part of the British Breakthrough. The history of his work is a series of ups and downs mixed with alcohol and drugs.
Early life
Eric Burdon was born in Newcastle (UK) when he was severely bombed by German troops in 1941. By origin, the future singer is a proletarian, despite the fact that his father was an electrical engineer.
He grew up among ordinary workers and went to school, which was located between the shipyard and the slaughterhouse. This gave rise to his musical preferences and the closeness of his views to the philosophy of blues.
Fifteen-year-old boy, he enters the College of Art, where he masters the specialty "artist-decorator." Here he is even more interested in blues and jazz. Being white, he wholeheartedly understands the mood of dark-skinned musicians who revealed in their work the problems of outcasts and losers, without choosing beautiful words for this.
He heard the record of his idol Jimmy Wedderspoon to the holes. Could a young student then dream that his idol would ever want to record a joint album with him?
It is under the influence of this artist that Eric Burdon, a singer, will be born: one day a young student dares to go on stage in a smoky club full of people.
The Animals Appear
When Eric Burdon came as a vocalist to the ensemble of Alan Price, no one could suspect that this would be the beginning of a musical breakthrough on the world stage. The young man immediately offered to rename the team more loudly - The Animals. These Beasts quickly grew out of the eatery team format and began performing at top clubs in central Newcastle.
In the spring of 1963 they went on a tour of the UK with Chuck Berry. Between performances, the musicians are actively working on recording their own material and releasing the fateful composition The House of the Rising Sun for them. Prior to this, the song was performed by various singers and groups, but it became popular only thanks to The Animals. This song made the band world famous. She took the first lines of the popular British and American charts.
But fate decreed that the group soon split up, lasting only a couple of years. In the future, Eric Burdon will repeatedly make attempts to revive the team under various names.
The Conquest of America
Eric Burdon & the New Animals is the new musician band that allowed the British team to conquer the American mainland. In 1967, this group was born, led by Eric Burdon. The discography of the group is a lot of good albums, the best of which is The Wind of Change.
It was with him that Eric travels to San Francisco (USA) to become part of a new subculture - hippies. The San Francisco Nights hit is born here.
With the development of a new fashionable musical style - psychedelic - drugs are actively spreading among musicians, many of which were not yet banned in those years. Byrdon did not stay in side: along with hippies, he began to try different psychotropic drugs.
At a music festival in Monteri, the band performs on the same stage with Jimmy Hendrix. They became so friends that they started touring together.
Despite all the success, the "New Beasts" also did not last long. After the breakup of the group, the musician stops performing for a year.
With War versus War
Not being a black man, the musician was always close in spirit to the work of Negro musicians. He said that black blood flows in his veins.
That's why Eric is happy to start working with the African-American sextet The Night Shift. He just did not like the name of a little-known collective. Therefore, he renames it War and then gradually leads to world fame.
Eric Burdon put all the power of his talent into the new project. Photos of the band began to appear on the covers of music publications, and the songs sounded on almost all radio stations.
In the early seventies, the group actively toured America and Europe. At one of the concerts, due to drugs, Eric becomes ill, and he can no longer continue the tour. But the team copes well without it. This fact caused Burdon to leave the group.
Attempts to conquer the scene
After this, Eric Burdon will repeatedly try to return to the big stage, but he will not be able to achieve his former popularity. New projects find no response at record studios. Therefore, the musician is trying to revive his first group in the original composition.
For some time he manages to remind himself of himself by rewriting the immortal hit “The House of ...”, but this was not enough. The popularity of the "new" group was very selective: in America and Britain, it gathered small audience of fans, while in Germany it was possible to do concerts in stadiums.
During the 80-90s of the last century, Burdon repeatedly tries to return to the big stage, but he still does not succeed. The musician is gradually becoming a legend.
Eric Burdon: family
Active concert activities, drugs and booze, crowds of female fans did not contribute to strengthening family life. Eric got married twice. His first wife in 1967 was Angie King, but the marriage lasted a little over a year.
The second time Eric married in 1972, and already in 1974, his beloved Rose gave birth to a daughter. But this marriage did not last long.
Talented musicians have to pay for their fame. For Eric, this price was a family, but considerable popularity came to him. Today, his name is forever inscribed in textbooks on the history of world music. Despite his impressive age, the musician continues his activity, actively traveling around the world.