He would have gotten a fourth Rock Hall induction, had he been successful in his quest in join another "Band." "I first met Eric in Los Angeles around the time Music from Big Pink came out," The Band's Robbie Robertson told Spinner, earlier this year. "[Later] he came to our house in Woodstock to visit with us. I thought he was just curious but then he said years later that the real reason was that he had come to join The Band. I made a joke out of it, saying, 'Were you implying that we need a new guitar player?'" Ironically, Clapton presented The Band with their Rock Hall induction in 1994.

The one instance in which he believed he might retire from music was… when he left The Yardbirds. "The Yardbirds were determined to have a hit and I was determined not to be involved with that," Clapton told Larry King, in 1998. "I actually thought I was going to retire. I was 18 years old, and I thought, it's over. Every band I looked at had the same agenda: Let's get a hit record and recording contract. And I kind of went, and then what? For me, the road was about a different thing altogether."