Eric Clapton (ft. Marcy Levy) – "The Core" (1977)

I can burn

Without fuel

“The Core” – which was released on Eric Clapton’s Slowhand album in 1977 – isn’t as well known as “I Shot the Sheriff,” or “Lay Down Sally,” or “Wonderful Tonight,” or “Cocaine.”

But I think it’s the best song on any of Clapton’s solo albums – thanks in large part to the saxophone playing of Mel Collins, the Hammond B3 work of Dick Sims, and especially Marcy Levy’s vocals.  

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It’s only fair that Marcy Levy shared lead vocal duties on “The Core,” since she and Eric Clapton co-wrote that song.  (She also co-wrote “Lay Down Sally.”)

Levy, who was born in Detroit in 1952, decided to move to Tulsa after meeting Leon Russell.  (Levy sang back-up vocals on Bob Seger’s Back in ’72 album, which was recorded at Russell’s Oklahoma recording studio.)  

Through Russell, she met Eric Clapton – who was smack dab in the middle of his “Tulsa Sound” period – and ended up touring and recording with him for four years.

Eric Clapton and Marcy Levy in 1975

Levy was a highly sought after back-up singer, and she had some success as a songwriter.  But she wanted a solo career.

Unfortunately, her debut solo album – which was released in 1982 – didn’t sell and her record company dropped her.

A few years later, Levy hooked up with Bananarama’s Siobhan Fahey to form Shakespears [sic] Sister.  Their second album, which was titled Hormonally Yours – both women were pregnant at the time it was recorded – spent over a year on the Billboard album charts and eventually went double platinum:  

Levy called herself Marcella Detroit while she was with Shakespears Sister.  She used that moniker on the first two solo albums that she recorded after Shakespears Sister broke up, but reverted to her birth name when she formed the Marcy Levy Band in 2002.  

But when the Marcy Levy Band split up several years later, she went back to calling herself Marcella Detroit.   (So confusing!)

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Have you figured out the theme of this year’s “28 Songs in 28 Days” yet?

It’s as plain as the nose on your face: all the songs featured on 2 or 3 lines this month were by artists who recorded under names other than those they were born with.

Except for Eric Clapton, that is.

Marcy Levy performing with
Eric Clapton in London in 2018

Like Bobby Darin, Clapton was born to an unmarried teenage mother whose family wanted to conceal her pregnancy.  Each man grew up thinking that his grandmother was his mother, and that his mother was his older sister.

Clapton was born a few months before the end of World War II.  His father was a married Canadian soldier who was shipped off to combat before young Eric was born, and who returned to Canada and his wife after the war was over.  

Clapton’s grandmother’s first husband was named Clapton – he was the biological father of Clapton’s mother.  But Eric grew up thinking his grandmother and her second husband – a man named Jack Clapp – were his parents.  His grandmother told him the truth when he was nine years old.  

A lot of people think Clapton’s real name is Eric Clapp – he himself would have thought that was his name when he was a young child – but his mother’s surname was Clapton, so that is presumably the name on his birth certificate.

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Click here to listen to “The Core.”

Click on the link below to buy the song from Amazon: