The name of the album is that for a long time local bluesman JJ Cale moved to Valley Center in Escondido in 1989. The cover photo for «The Road to Escondido» was shot on the shoulder of a two-lane country road. It shows a baseball-hatted Clapton, casually strumming an acoustic guitar as he sits on the back of a weathered pickup truck. Its hood is aloft and Cale stands nearby with a hand-scrawled cardboard sign that reads: ‘Escondido’. The photo was taken when Clapton visited the Cale home in Valley Center in 2006 when they recorded the album, The Road to Escondido, which later won a Grammy Award. JJ Cale Despite the claims of some who say that they «see» Valley Center in the album cover, it was not shot anywhere near here. It was taken near Paramount Ranch, which is north of Los Angeles between Highway 101 and Malibu Creek State Park.
John Weldon "J. J." Cale (December 5, 1938 – July 26, 2013) was an American guitarist, singer, songwriter and music engineer. Though he avoided the limelight, his influence as a musical artist has been widely acknowledged by figures such as Mark Knopfler, Neil Young and Eric Clapton, who described him as "one of the most important artists in the history of rock". He is considered to be one of the originators of the Tulsa sound, a loose genre drawing on blues, rockabilly, country, and jazz.
In 2008, Cale and Clapton received a Grammy Award for their album The Road to Escondido.
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