But We're Going Wrong, which first appeared on Cream's Disraeli Gears album in 1967, is perfect for its simplicity, for its emotion and, of course, for the musicianship.
Ginger Baker's wonderful tom-tom patterns on a 6/8 rhythm could probably hold the song together on their own. Jack Bruce's bass is largely restrained, but his pure voice is increasingly unrestrained as the song unfolds. And then we get Eric Clapton, at the height of his fuzzy-haired, woman-tone period, with sublime notes played in just the right places.
On stage in the Sixties, the song became a tour de force, and still possessed its power when Cream revived it — and themselves — in 2005.
Many listeners, particularly in 1967, took We're Going Wrong to be a political/philosophical/protest kind of a song. Look at the lyrics and you'll see why. But it is documented that Jack Bruce wrote it after a row with his wife, and that it is simply about a fractured relationship.
Whether it's about the failed relationship between two particular people or about all the failed relationships that make up the world we live in, the song works. And if the microcosm and the macrocosm are all one, then it's not even worth differentiating.
Either way Jack Bruce wrote a masterpiece. For him, it might have been personal. For us, it's a perfect and universal call for change.
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