Eric Clapton was born in Ripley, Surrey, England, on March 30, 1945. His real father was a Canadian pilot but he didn't find that out until he was 53. When he was 2 his mother felt she was unable to look after him, so Eric then went to live with his grandparents. When he was 14 he took up the guitar, having been influenced by blues artists such as B.B King, Buddy Guy, Muddy Waters and John Lee Hooker. In 1963, after he was chucked out of art college, he joined Paul Samwell-Smith, as he was in art school with Keith Relf.
1971年1月11日，Mary J. Blige出生在美国纽约最北部的布朗克斯区，但是她早年的时光确是在佐治亚州的港口城市萨凡纳度过的，后来她和母亲、姐姐一起搬到了纽约东南部的杨克斯，5岁便遭到性侵害的她，童年带给她的只有创伤。不久她从高中辍学，和她的母亲一起打点理发室。16岁时，有一次她在纽约White Plains的一家卡拉OK演唱Anita Baker的“Caught Up in the Rapture”，并录制成了磁带，她的声音把Uptown Records唱片公司的总裁Andre Harrell吸引住了，很快她就得到了该公司的合同，但开始她只是在公司做些幕后工作，比如给大牌歌手做背景和声等。直到1992年，她得到了吹牛老爹Sean "Puffy" Combs的协助，在他的制作下，Mary J. Blige的第一张个人唱片《What's the 411?》终于正式发行，很快这张专辑便成为了Billboard R&B专辑榜的冠军，单曲“Real Love”和“You Remind Me”等分别成为了冠军单曲。这张专辑也是Mary J. Blige最受评论界好评的专辑之一，在这张专辑中，Mary J. Blige凭借着自己出色的声线谐和的把R&B音乐和说唱音乐结合在了一起，被称为是新的Aretha Franklin。
