Cello, viola, calliope, Swiss hand bells, glockenspiel?  On a rock album?  Are you kidding?  The members of Cream weren't really rock musicians; they didn't learn to play in some garage in the San Fernando Valley.  Jack Bruce was classically trained on cello.  He and Ginger Baker were seasoned jazz professionals and veterans of countless nights in London Jazz clubs. They were musical risk-takers, and highly inventive.  Eric Clapton, who grew up listening to the Mississippi Delta blues of Robert Johnson and the like, was a guitarist of considerable taste and imagination, who never overplayed his hand.  In producer Felix Pappalardi they had the perfect foil.  In the summer of 1968 Wheels of Fire dominated the playlist of the radio station where I lived (KRLA in Los Angeles), topped the album charts nation-wide, and became the first double-LP to be certified platinum.  Even more amazing, having reached the summit of Rock Stardom, as a band they decided to call it quits.  I was 20 years old at the time, and all these years later I still haven't quite gotten over it.