Great musicians who should have been famous except....

One man’s unfounded snipe is another’s expression of musical taste (or the lack thereof). Eric Clapton in The Last Waltz (I paraphrase, but very close to verbatim iirc): "Music had been headed in the wrong direction for a long time. When I heard Music From Big Pink (played to him by George Harrison), I thought ’Well, someone has finally got it right’."

As a result of hearing The Band, Clapton disbanded Cream, the biggest band in the world. He no longer wished to play music of the sort in which each player looked outward from their individual instruments, but rather music, like that of The Band, wherein each player (and singer) looked in towards the center (the song), playing so as to benefit the "greater good". That’s advanced musicianship, rarely found in Rock (or English fake Blues) bands.

When The Hawks (later known as The Band) met and jammed with Sonny Boy Williamson in 1965 (and began making plans for a U.S. tour together), he told them the bands he had been provided with by the promoter of the British tour he had just returned home from "Wanted to play Blues SO bad. And that’s just how they played it." ;-) One of those bands was The Yardbirds, whose guitarist at that time was.....Eric Clapton.

The opinion that John Bonham "was great" is one not universally held. Buddy Rich dismissed him, and reportedly did a great (mocking) imitation of him. Buddy also referred to Ginger Baker as a "clown". Tough audience! His comment on Ringo Starr was that he was "adequate". Coming from Buddy, that’s almost a compliment!

Well-known studio drummer Jim Keltner (Ry Cooder, John Lennon and George Harrison, Bob Dylan, Bill Frisell, hundreds of others) has said he wishes he played more like one of my favorites, Roger Hawkins of The Swampers (Fame Studios house band, heard on hundreds of records including all the Jerry Wexler-produced Atlantic albums made in that Muscle Shoals, Alabama recording studio).