As listeners, we become somewhat anaesthetised to the pain of our favourite musicians, and we hear them sing about love, heartbreak and betrayal so often that we almost take for granted the real-life experiences that inspired the songs, but when it comes to\u00a0Eric Clapton, there is truly no understating the gravity of his trauma.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
When he sang \u201cWould you know my name \/ If I saw you in Heaven?\u201d on \u2018Tears In Heaven\u2019, Clapton wasn\u2019t curiously speculating on the state of mortality and the potential afterlife; he was asking his late song a deeply existential question as a means of coping with the crippling trauma of his death. Because on March 20th, 1991,\u00a0Clapton\u2019s son Conor tragically died\u00a0after falling from a 53rd-floor New York City apartment window.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A shocking and almost unprecedented level of trauma not only shook the ground Clapton walked on, but that of his contemporaries too, who all galvanised in the wake of the tragedy. While\u00a0Clapton\u2019s own song\u00a0was a fitting tribute for Conor, his friend Phil Collins felt compelled to similarly write a track in honour of Clapton and his late song.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI wrote the lyrics for \u2018Since I Lost You\u2019 for Eric,\u201d he explained. \u201cEric was dry at the time, and I told him one of my concerns: that the easiest thing for him to do after this terrible loss would be to start drinking again. He said that, no, \u2018that would be the hardest thing\u2019. In the studio the next day, Mike, Tony and I, all of us good friends of Eric\u2019s, are talking about this unimaginable tragedy.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He continued, \u201cWe\u2019re working on a new piece of music. I start singing a lyric: \u2018My heart is broken in pieces.\u2019 Lily turned two earlier that same week, and I\u2019m thinking of all the times I\u2019m separated from her. I write from the perspective of a dad who is often a long way away from his kids and who has to entrust their care to others. It\u2019s a gnawing feeling that\u2019s always preyed on me. I\u2019ve long said to all my kids, \u2018Remember when you\u2019re crossing the road: stop, look both ways. I know it sounds dopey.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Honouring the privacy of his friend\u2019s trauma, Collins revealed how he ran the song by Clapton himself, checking that the deep-rooted feelings being excavated in his own music didn\u2019t run too close to the bone. But rather unexpectedly, Clapton had beaten Collins to the punch, revealing that he had written a song himself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThen he says that he\u2019s written a song,\u201d Collings remembered. He continued, \u201cHis label want to release it as a single. He\u2019s not sure, so he wants my opinion. Eric plays me \u2018Tears in Heaven\u2018. It\u2019s a beautiful song. In his grief, Eric has pulled together something extraordinary. Another reason to love him.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n