Peter Green is regarded by some fans as the greatest white blues guitarist ever,
Eric Clapton notwithstanding. Born
Peter Greenbaum but calling himself
Peter Green by age 15, he grew up in London's working-class East End.
Green's early musical influences were Hank Marvin of
the Shadows,
Muddy Waters,
B.B. King,
Freddie King, and traditional Jewish music. He originally played bass before being invited in 1966 by keyboardist
Peter Bardens to play lead in the Peter B's, whose drummer was a lanky chap named
Mick Fleetwood. The 19-year-old
Green was with
Bardens just three months before joining
John Mayall's
Bluesbreakers, whose rapidly shifting personnel included bassist
John McVie and drummer
Aynsley Dunbar. A keen fan of
Clapton,
Green badgered
Mayall to give him a chance when the
Bluesbreakers guitarist split for an indefinite vacation in Greece.
Green sounded great and, as
Mayall recalls, was not amused when
Clapton returned after a handful of gigs, and
Green was out.
After a bitter, rambling solo album called The End of the Game, Greensaddened fans when he hung up his guitar, except for helping the Maccomplete a tour when Spencer suddenly joined the Children of God in Los Angeles and quit the band. Green's chaotic odyssey of almost a decade included rumors that he was a gravedigger, a bartender in Cornwall, a hospital orderly, and a member of an Israeli commune. When an accountant sent him an unwanted royalty check, Green confronted his tormentor with a gun, although it was unloaded. Green went to jail briefly before being transferred to an asylum.When Green left Mayall in 1967, he took McVie and Fleetwood to foundPeter Green's Fleetwood Mac. Jeremy Spencer and Danny Kirwan shortly afterward gave Fleetwood Mac an unusual three-guitar front line. Green was at his peak for the albums Mr. Wonderful, English Rose, Then Play On, and a live Boston Tea Party recording. His instrumental "Albatross" was the band's first British number one single and "Black Magic Woman" was later a huge hit for Carlos Santana. But Green had been experimenting with acid and his behavior became increasingly irrational, especially after he disappeared for three days of rampant drug use in Munich. He became very religious, appearing on-stage wearing crucifixes and flowing robes. His bandmates resisted Green's suggestion to donate most of their money to charity, and he left in mid-1970 after writing a harrowing biographical tune called "The Green Manalishi."When Clapton left the band for good six months later to form Cream, Mayallcajoled Green back. Fans were openly hostile because Green was not God, although they appreciated Clapton's replacement in time. Producer Mike Vernon was aghast when the Bluesbreakers showed up without Clapton to record the album A Hard Road in late 1966, but was won over by Green's playing. On many tracks you'd be hard-pressed to tell it wasn't Claptonplaying. With an eerie Green instrumental called "The Supernatural," he demonstrated the beginning of his trademark fluid, haunting style so reminiscent of B.B. King.Green emerged in the late '70s and early '80s with albums In the Skies,Little Dreamer, White Sky, and Kolors, featuring at times Bardens, Robin Trower drummer Reg Isidore, and Fairport Convention drummer Dave Mattacks. He reprised the Then Play On Mac standard "Rattlesnake Shake" on Fleetwood's solo 1981 album, The Visitor. British author Martin Celmins wrote Green's biography in 1995. Psychologically troubled, on medication, and hardly playing the guitar for most of the '90s, the reclusive Greenresumed sporadic recording in the second half of the decade. He surfaces unexpectedly from time to time, most prominently January 12, 1998, whenFleetwood Mac was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame. In a rare, perfect moment, Green jammed with fellow inductee Santana on "Black Magic Woman."Mick Green is one of the most self-effacing guitar legends in rock & roll. Since the early '60s, as a member of
Johnny Kidd & the Pirates, his guitar style -- mixing lead and rhythm parts in one -- has been an inspiration to three generations of musicians, including
the Who's
Pete Townshend and
Dr. Feelgood's
Wilko Johnson. Yet he remains amazingly elusive as a subject, preferring to stay in the background except when he's playing.
Green's first steady gig was as a member of the Red Caps, a group (named in honor of
Gene Vincent's band the Blue Caps) that backed late-'50s pop-rocker Cuddly Dudley. The Red Caps' membership also included guitarist
Johnny Patto, bassist
Johnny Spence, and drummer
Frank Farley, all of whom had joined
Johnny Kidd in 1961 as the new lineup of his backing band
the Pirates. By March of 1962, however, Patto had tired of touring and quit, and he was replaced by Green.
It was a song called "I'll Never Get Over You," which rose to number four, that established Green, his searing lead guitar being one of the most aggressive sounds heard on record in England during this period. Though it would take a few years for anyone to find it out, the song became practically an anthem for a generation of garage rock and punk enthusiasts.
As a member of
the Pirates,
Mick Green became one of a tiny handful of young guitar heroes of the pre-
Beatles era in English rock & roll. Generating a loud, slashing sound from his Fender Telecaster Deluxe that combined the lead and rhythm guitar parts in one, Green's playing ran completely counter to the more open two-guitar sound that dominated English rock & roll. Among those who picked up on the lean, muscular sound Green created was
Tony Hicks, future member of
the Hollies. Ironically, even though session guitarist
Joe Moretti (subbing for
Alan Caddy) and not Green, had played on the original "Shakin' All Over," Green, as the most visible guitarist in
the Pirates' history, became permanently associated with that song, and vice versa.
Although he wasn't widely recognized in the press at the time, or by the world outside of the music community, Green was as influential a musician during this period as any of England's early rock guitar heroes, including
Hank Marvin of the Shadows,
Joe Brown, and
Big Jim Sullivan. Moreover, he exerted as much or more impact on rock & roll in England from 1962 onward as
George Harrison,
Eric Clapton,
Jeff Beck, or
Jimmy Page would later be credited with.
Johnny Kidd & the Pirates were popular among other musicians and made a living playing clubs and smaller concert venues, but they were unable to sustain their recording success past the early '60s. From 1963 onward, with money being thrust in ever-larger amounts into the hands of
the Beatles and other Liverpool acts,
the Pirates began falling behind the wave of new acts, unable to rate better than support act status at major venues (though the early
Who also played in support of them). This was an instance of the parts being bigger than the whole and by 1964, Green's reputation had outstripped that of
the Pirates. He was lured away from the band by an offer to join
the Dakotas, who were then placing records very high on the charts and playing around the world as the backing band for
Billy J. Kramer, but needed more muscle in their live sound.
Green shored up that band, which, with his arrival, became one of the few groups of the period to boast a double lead guitar lineup. He made them one of the most respected backing groups in England, although the only hit Green ever played on was the distinctly pop-oriented "Trains and Boats and Planes." He was later joined in
the Dakotas by ex-Pirate/Red Cap
Frank Farley on drums, and the two worked together up through 1967, when
the Dakotas broke up. (Kidd re-formed
the Pirates and was attempting a comeback that ended with his death in a car crash in 1966, though the newer
Pirates kept playing together until 1967).
Green hooked up for a short time with
Cliff Bennett before he and
Farley became part of
Engelbert Humperdinck's backing band, spending seven years in that well-remunerated but musically low-visibility position, playing Las Vegas and related venues. Green later played in the group
Shanghai, which included
John "Speedy" Keen in the lineup, which lasted for two years. During the mid-'70s, however, the admiration that Green evoked within the music community began to emerge in the press.
Wilko Johnson of
Dr. Feelgood, in particular, was highly outspoken in his praise for Green. Additionally, several histories of
the Who, appearing at a time when the latter band was at the peak of its popularity, credited
Johnny Kidd & the Pirates and particularly
Mick Green with their role in shaping the group's sound. It was only a short jump for the English music press to draw the connection to Green as one of the progenitors of the then-burgeoning punk sound.
During this same period, Spence and
Farley had begun playing together again and a one-off
Pirates reunion gig was arranged. That 1976 gig proved so successful that it resulted in a recording contract and a semi-permanent reunion.
the Pirates became a going concern as a performing band and even managed to release albums, cut live and in the studio, that were distrubuted internationally. Green cut a striking figure on guitar during the second
Pirates incarnation, a heavy athlete's build topped by an intense yet clear-eyed expression, coaxing explosive solos out of his instrument.
the Pirates trio became a cult band with a wide reputation, their sound during the 1970s and beyond embraced punk, rockabilly, blues, and classic rock & roll.
In more recent years, Green has been recognized as one of British rock & roll's elder statesmen, but remains a busy working musician playing with figures as different as
Paul McCartney and
Peter Green in the 1980s and 1990s. The
McCartney gigs, in particular, on the so-called "Russian album" and several of the former
Beatle's subsequent rock & roll ventures, have given Green more mass exposure than at any time in his career and introduced his name to at least a portion of
the Beatles' following. Along with reissues of
Johnny Kidd & the Pirates' early-'60s work and
the Pirates' latter-day recordings, and his music with
the Dakotas, the
McCartney rock & roll sides comprise Green's most visible music.
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