Stream It Or Skip It?

Eric Clapton Unplugged…Over 30 Years Later, now streaming on Paramount+, revisits the Hall of Fame singer, guitarist, and songwriter’s 1992 acoustic set for MTV, which revitalized his career for a new decade, added a few Grammys to his overall tally, and ended up becoming the biggest-selling live album of all time. Why is this re-appearing now, in 2025? Well, Clapton’s got a mostly-new solo record out, his 22nd, entitled Meanwhile. But maybe you’re itching for a Slowhand from back in the just-got-sober era of Journeyman, his 11th solo effort from 1989. You might also be interested in the interview that Unplugged…Over 30 Years Later includes, conducted with Clapton right before the show. “It’s such a joy to sing with a full band acoustically,” says the veteran of many loud rock and blues bands, “because you’re able to hear your own voice.”

Opening Shot: In the original opening for his episode of MTV Unplugged, which first aired in August 1992, a small audience is gathered at Bray Studios outside London for the performance by Eric Clapton and his band. In a sign of the times, Clapton’s cigarette burns in an ashtray alongside.  

The Gist: Back in ‘92, probably the biggest splash MTV’s Unplugged had made to date was with Mariah Carey’s performance that March, and with R.E.M.’s set from the year before. (Both would be released as live albums.) While Clapton won a Grammy for Journeyman, he was still known mostly for his 1960s and ’70s work with the Yardbirds, Cream, and Derek and the Dominos. “Layla,” the signature Dominos track, had recently found life beyond classic rock radio with its prominent placement in Martin Scorsese’s 1990 gangster film Goodfellas. And so maybe MTV didn’t know what to expect from this acoustic booking for a legacy artist. But it was Eric Clapton’s shuffling, jazzy, octave-lowered version of “Layla” for Unplugged that became a breakout hit, both for Boomer-gen audiences and early ‘90s American culture in general.

While the studio version of “Layla” features electric guitar riffs for days, that wasn’t gonna be possible for the acoustic demands of Unplugged. And as Clapton says in the 1992 interview that accompanies Unplugged…Over 30 Years Later, “it mystified me that I’d done it the same all these years.” Citing Bob Dylan as an artist who “changes everything every time he plays it,” Clapton says he was inspired to try it on the newer, softer arrangement that appears here. 

Clapton also performs “Tears in Heaven” for Unplugged, written about the death of his four-year-old son Conor in 1991 – the ballad became a massive, massive hit on its own, but first appeared in Rush, the highly rewatchable cops-going-criminal film starring Jennifer Jason Leigh and Jason Patric – and a rousing version of the Bo Diddley composition “Before You Accuse Me,” which he had included on Journeyman. The Diddley shout-out makes particular sense here, since Clapton fills out his Unplugged set with blues songs that always inspired him – from Bessie Smith, Big Bill Broonzy, Robert Johnson, and other leading lights – going all the way back to his days as a teenage guitar player in the pubs of Surrey, England.

What Shows Will It Remind You Of? Paramount+ has only a sporadic relationship with Unplugged. Currently, single episodes from four different seasons are the only things streaming, which is weird because Paramount owns MTV’s entire programming archive. (If it’s us, we’re putting all of the Unplugged stuff on the site under its own searchable tab.) In the meantime, if you caught Timmy Chalamet as Clapton contemporary Bob Dylan in A Complete Unknown, Decider has you covered on what Dylan-related stuff to watch next.  

Our Take: Beyond “Layla” and “Tears of Heaven,” which became inescapable in an era where everybody still listened to music on the radio, whether we’re talking about 1992 or Eric Clapton Unplugged…Over 30 Years Later, it’s the blues numbers that really define this acoustic set for MTV. Clapton’s guitar-playing was always his calling card – whether or not anyone ever actually called him “Slowhand,” it’s a super-cool nickname – and the runs he makes in Unplugged on an array of Martin guitars, alongside guitarist Andy Fairweather Low, are compact, expressive, and often downright swinging. Clapton doesn’t really smile a lot, but he’s definitely having fun, like on “Hey Hey,” originally by Big Bill Broonzy, or the Robert Johnson standard “Walking Blues,” which as Clapton studiously notes in his interview, he actually plays in the style of Muddy Waters. It’s a referential nod from one of the finest guitar players of his generation, a two-way tribute to the guitar-playing bluesmen that inspired Clapton when he was just a kid.   

Sex and Skin: What? No way.

Parting Shot: The band and a clapping-along audience get a little wild for set closer “Rollin’ & Tumblin’,” a rollicking old Muddy Waters song Clapton used to perform with Cream.

Sleeper Star: Naturally, the sleeper stars here are Eric Clapton’s gorgeous and gorgeous-sounding acoustic guitars. He mainly used two Martins on Unplugged – a 000-42 from 1939, and a 1966 000-28 – while for “Running on Faith,” “Walking Blues,” and “Rollin’ & Tumblin’,” all played with a slide, he switched to an acoustic topped by an immaculate, custom-engraved metal resonator.

Most Pilot-y Line: “Most of the songs in the set,” Clapton says in the interview that accompanies Unplugged…Over 30 Years Later, “they’re covers of songs I heard when I was very young, that I’ve always wanted to do.”

Our Call: Eric Clapton Unplugged…30 Years Later is a Stream It, but pretty much exclusively for existing fans of the guitarist, singer, and Rock and Roll Hall of Famer. With the feature interview added, it offers a more complete package than trying to scare up old DVDs of Clapton’s original Unplugged performance, or digging for excerpts on YouTube. 

Johnny Loftus (@glennganges) is an independent writer and editor living at large in Chicagoland. His work has appeared in The Village Voice, All Music Guide, Pitchfork Media, and Nicki Swift.