{"id":632720,"date":"2026-06-11T08:25:15","date_gmt":"2026-06-11T08:25:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/632720\/"},"modified":"2026-06-11T08:25:15","modified_gmt":"2026-06-11T08:25:15","slug":"peter-green-interview-the-life-of-fleetwood-macs-founder","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/632720\/","title":{"rendered":"Peter Green interview: the life of Fleetwood Mac\u2019s founder"},"content":{"rendered":"

Hailed as a genius by everyone from Eric Clapton<\/a> to Noel Gallagher<\/a>, late Fleetwood Mac founder Peter Green<\/a> was one of the greatest British blues guitarists of his generation. In 2012, eight years before his death at the age of 73, Classic Rock was granted a rare audience with a reclusive man who changed music without ever truly conquering his demons.<\/p>\n

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\"Lightning\n<\/p>\n

Peter Green sits in his lawyer\u2019s office overlooking one of London\u2019s most popular shopping thoroughfares. As you climb the stairs, you can hear the guitarist\u2019s sing-song East End accent drifting down from above. Later, Green will compare his appearance in the 1960s to that of a \u201criverboat captain\u201d. In fact, the description better suits his 65-year-old self. Today, he wears a yellow polo shirt, is clean-shaven, and has the remains of his white hair cut short, but he\u2019d still look at home behind the wheel of a tugboat puttering up the Thames.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Then again, incongruity is all part of the Peter Green story. His work with John Mayall\u2019s Bluesbreakers<\/a> and Fleetwood Mac has inspired musicians as diverse as Carlos Santana, Gary Moore and Noel Gallagher. Then, just as rock music was becoming big business, Green turned his back on it all, tortured by guilt over the money he was making and with his thought processes damaged by hallucinogenic drugs.<\/p>\n

Latest Videos From Louder<\/p>\n

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Too often, though, the mythology surrounding Peter Green crowds out his musical achievements. During a creative burst that lasted a little over five years, Green became the guitar hero\u2019s guitar hero. An instinctive musician with a powerful but unadorned style of playing, he eschewed the flash and braggadocio of his peers while earning their respect and admiration. Even in the decade of Jeff Beck<\/a>, Eric Clapton and Jimmy Page, Green carved out his own niche. Tracks such as the timeless Oh Well, Man Of The World and Need Your Love So Bad established him as a singular songwriter, a blues purist who ended up creating his own style of blues. Peter Green is a unique but these days often overlooked talent.<\/p>\n

When he cracks a smile, you briefly glimpse the pop star he once was. While he\u2019s anything but the hopeless acid casualty of rock legend, Green broadcasts on his own wavelength. During our hour together he\u2019s funny, fascinating, confused, confusing, sometimes frustratingly self-deprecating but, most importantly, lucid \u2013 not least when talking about his music and where it came from. \u201cThe thing about the blues,\u201d he says, \u201cwas making it mean something to me personally.\u201d<\/p>\n

You may like<\/p>\n

\n

\"Peter\n<\/p>\n

Peter Green onstage in the late 1960s (Image credit: George Wilkes\/Hulton Archive\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n

Peter Green was born Peter Allen Greenbaum on October 29, 1946, the youngest of four, into a Jewish family in Mile End, East London. Ten years earlier, Oswald Mosley and his British Union Of Fascists had clashed with the local Jewish community while trying to march through their neighbourhood. Two years after Peter\u2019s birth, his father changed the family name by deed poll to Green and moved them west to Putney.<\/p>\n

For many years, Green hinted at a childhood troubled by anti-Semitism. \u201cI was always a sad person,\u201d he claimed in 1978. \u201cI felt a deep sadness with my heritage.\u201d Elder brother Michael, talking to Green\u2019s biographer Martin Celmins, recalled: \u201cA couple of times local kids would throw stones at the window and shout, \u2018Yid.\u2019\u201d He admitted that it may have left an impression on Peter, who he described as a sensitive child who \u201cquestioned everything\u201d.<\/p>\n

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Green first picked up a guitar at the age of 10, after watching Michael and his other brother Lenny playing, but claims he \u201cdidn\u2019t take it seriously\u201d until he reached his teens. By then he\u2019d developed a good ear for music and could mimic singers he heard on the radio. His playing was now far ahead of both siblings. \u201cPeter was a natural,\u201d said Michael. \u201cI\u2019d be thinking: \u2018God, I\u2019ll never be able to do what he\u2019s doing there.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

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\"The\n<\/p>\n

This feature originally appeared in Classic Rock issue 174 (July 2012) (Image credit: Future)<\/p>\n

Hearing a friend\u2019s 78rpm record of Muddy Waters<\/a>\u2019s Honey Bee turned Green on to the blues, a musical obsession that would never leave him. After quitting school, he took jobs as a butcher\u2019s boy and apprentice French polisher, while playing bass in a West London dance band called the Ken Cats and, later, with Eel Pie Island regulars The Muskrats. When he wasn\u2019t playing gigs himself, Green could be found back at the Crawdaddy club in Richmond or the dilapidated Eel Pie Island Hotel, watching the likes of The Yardbirds and assessing the competition. It was while playing with The Muskrats that his musical ambition became apparent. Just as with his brothers, his playing ability was ahead of his bandmates. It quickly became apparent that he wouldn\u2019t stick with the amateur group forever.<\/p>\n

In August 1965, Green felt confident enough to hustle his way into a gig with John Mayall\u2019s Bluesbreakers, a boot camp\/finishing school for some of the UK\u2019s finest blues musicians. Bluesbreakers guitarist Eric Clapton had taken temporary leave and gone to Greece. Such was his reputation that the words \u2018Clapton Is God\u2019 had been spray\u2011painted on a wall in North London. Mayall appointed a replacement, Jeff Kribbett, but Green caught a show at London\u2019s Marquee and was unimpressed.<\/p>\n

What to read next<\/p>\n

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\"Fleetwood\n<\/p>\n

Fleetwood Mac in 1968: (from left) Mick Fleetwood, Peter Green, Jeremy Spencer, John McVie (Image credit: Keystone Features\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n

\u201cHe kept coming down to all the gigs and saying: \u2018I\u2019m much better than him,\u2019\u201d recalled Mayall. In the end, he let \u201cthe Cockney kid\u201d take over. But the pushy 19-year-old who talked his way into one of London\u2019s hottest groups is utterly at odds with the self-deprecating 65-year-old of today.<\/p>\n

\u201cJohn Mayall paid me a great compliment. He said I was the best guitarist he\u2019d heard since Eric Clapton,\u201d says Green. \u201cI tried to float on that. But I used to drink before I went on. It seemed to be the thing where everyone went to the pub. I couldn\u2019t play properly. Most of them [gigs] I flunked.\u201d<\/p>\n

If Mayall was disappointed, he never said so. When Clapton returned, he was impressed by his understudy. \u201cHe was a real Turk,\u201d the guitarist later said of Green. \u201cA strong, confident person who knew exactly where he was going.\u201d But after just three gigs, Clapton resumed his place in the band, to Green\u2019s profound disappointment.<\/p>\n

Undeterred, in February the following year, Green auditioned for Peter B\u2019s Looners. Peter B was Peter Bardens, a keyboard player who would later find success in Camel. Their drummer was a gangling, six-foot-five loose cannon named Mick Fleetwood<\/a>. \u201cThey had funny clothes on,\u201d Green says now. \u201cHipsters with big belts and fancy buckles. It might have been Carnaby Street stuff, but it blew my mind.\u201d Green landed the job, but with his denim jeans and \u201criver boat captain\u201d sideburns, he\u2019d yet to embrace the boutique fashions of the era. \u201cPeter Bardens would say to me: \u2018You look like a dustman,\u2019\u201d he grins. For Green, it really was all about the music.<\/p>\n

He made his recording debut with Peter B later that year, on the Booker T-inspired single If You Want To Be Happy. In July, when Clapton quit the Bluesbreakers to start Cream, John Mayall knew whom to call.<\/p>\n

Mayall\u2019s landmark album Blues Breakers With Eric Clapton had only just come out. By October 1966, Mayall and his group were back in Decca Studios in West Hampstead \u2013 but minus their godlike lead guitarist. \u201cAs the band walked in the studio, I noticed an amplifier which I never saw before,\u201d recalled producer Mike Vernon. \u201cSo I said to John Mayall: \u2018Where\u2019s Eric Clapton?\u2019 Mayall answered: \u2018He\u2019s not with us any more. He left us a few weeks ago\u2026 Don\u2019t worry, we got someone better.\u2019\u201d Vernon was incredulous. But Mayall was adamant that \u201cin a couple of years he\u2019s [Peter Green] going to be the best\u201d.<\/p>\n

The Bluesbreakers\u2019 next album, A Hard Road, featured two Green compositions, including an instrumental, The Supernatural, on which he sketched out a sinuous, improvised style of playing, later revisited on Fleetwood Mac\u2019s Black Magic Woman.On the road, though, Green faced sceptical audiences.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t know anyone who wouldn\u2019t be worried about having to follow Eric,\u201d he says now. There were hecklers. But within a fortnight, Green had won them over. While Clapton would soon be finessing a high-speed style of playing with Cream, Green favoured slow, measured solos. \u201cPeter had a deftness, a more melodic style\u2026 deeper blues,\u201d said Mike Vernon.<\/p>\n

Green has mixed feelings about his playing from that time: \u201cSometimes I\u2019d feel confident. Other times I feel like I\u2019m going too fast.\u201d He also noticed that the faster he played, the more favourably some of the audience responded. The era of the guitar hero had arrived. But Green condemned the craze for what he called \u201c7,541 notes a minute\u201d. He wanted no part of it. \u201cI don\u2019t like people to say to me: \u2018Oh, you\u2019re better than Eric Clapton,\u2019 all this kind of thing. People used to do that, and I didn\u2019t know where to put myself.\u201d<\/p>\n

Green had another fortuitous encounter while in the Bluesbreakers. Their bassist at the time was 20-year-old trainee tax inspector John McVie. Then, in April 67, Green\u2019s old Peter B\u2019s Looners bandmate Mick Fleetwood became the Bluesbreakers\u2019 drummer. Fleetwood lasted just two weeks before getting sacked for turning up drunk, but for a short time, the three key members of what would become Fleetwood Mac performed together. As a birthday gift to Green, John Mayall paid for a recording session. One of the tracks recorded at the session was given the title Fleetwood Mac.<\/p>\n

By now, though, Green was getting restless. \u201cI didn\u2019t agree with the kind of material which was being played [in the Bluesbreakers],\u201d he told Record Mirror. \u201cIt was becoming less and less of the blues. We\u2019d do the same thing, night after night. John would say something to the audience and count us in, and I\u2019d groan inwardly.\u201d<\/p>\n

With Mayall\u2019s blessing, Green handed in his notice and started auditioning musicians for his own group. Mike Vernon had discovered an Elmore James-obsessed 19-year-old guitarist called Jeremy Spencer playing in a trio called the Levi Set. In June, Vernon arranged a support slot for the group with the Bluesbreakers in Birmingham. He also tipped Spencer off that Green was leaving.<\/p>\n

\u201cI met Peter at the Birmingham Metro Club,\u201d says Jeremy Spencer now. \u201cHe wanted to hear me play because he wanted to form a new band and was intense about doing straight Chicago blues.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\"Fleetwood\n<\/p>\n

Fleetwood Mac performing on Top Of The Pops in 1969 (Image credit: Ivan Keeman\/Redferns)<\/p>\n

Spencer auditioned, but didn\u2019t think he\u2019d passed. At the end of the night he was surprised when Green told him he\u2019d got the job. Green then showed Spencer something he\u2019d written in his notebook on the drive up to Birmingham. \u201cIt was like a prayer that said something like, \u2018I can\u2019t go on with this music like it is. Please have Jeremy be good, please have him be good,\u2019\u201d says Spencer.<\/p>\n

Next, Green called Mick Fleetwood. The drummer was about to buy a set of ladders for his new job as a window cleaner, and he accepted Green\u2019s offer. John McVie, however, was reluctant to give up a regular pay packet with Mayall, and turned Green down. As a temporary measure, Green hired 24-year-old trainee teacher Bob Brunning on bass. But it was evidence of Green\u2019s lack of ego and belief that McVie would join eventually that he christened the new band Fleetwood Mac, the name they\u2019d given to a song recorded at the Mayall-funded session.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn my personal estimation, Peter Green was just about the very best blues guitarist this country has ever produced,\u201d Mike Vernon said in 1994. Vernon lost no time in signing Fleetwood Mac to his new Blue Horizon label. The band made their live debut in August 1967 at the Windsor Jazz & Blues Festival. Eric Clapton strolled around backstage, sporting a Hendrix-style perm and draped in what one eyewitness thought was a bedspread. Spotting Green in T-shirt and baggy jeans, Clapton told him: \u201cPeter, you\u2019ll never be a star if you dress like that.\u201d Green smiled, but said nothing. It was still all about the music.<\/p>\n

A month later, as Green predicted, John McVie took over from Bob Brunning. Fleetwood Mac\u2019s debut album \u2013 titled, against Green\u2019s wishes, Peter Green\u2019s Fleetwood Mac \u2013 was released in February 68. It reached No.4 and stayed in the UK chart for a year. Mixing Spencer and Green originals and a cover of Elmore James\u2019s Shake Your Moneymaker, it was, says Spencer, \u201ca spontaneous release, which we all enjoyed\u201d.<\/p>\n

Green is less sure. \u201cI don\u2019t have fond memories of it, no,\u201d he says. \u201cBecause I had to do the singing, and I really shouldn\u2019t be doing it.\u201d To listeners then and now, Green\u2019s expressive voice is a highlight of the record. But he won\u2019t be swayed. \u201cIn the traditional old jazz bands, they\u2019d get one of the musicians to try a bit of singing. But he would only be talking. I categorise myself as like that. We used to play down the Flamingo. One night Ruby Turner got up and sang with us, and I was so relieved. I thought, \u2018Wouldn\u2019t it be good if I could play like this all the time.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

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\"Peter\n<\/p>\n

Peter Green in 1969 (Image credit: George Wilkes\/Hulton Archive\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n

If Green felt insecure at the time, he hid it well. In May 1968, Fleetwood Mac\u2019s single Black Magic Woman, a song about the guitarist\u2019s sexual frustration, snuck into the Top 40. With barely time to draw breath, Fleetwood Mac were back in the studio in the spring of 1968 to make their second album, Mr Wonderful.<\/p>\n

From these sessions came another single, the exquisite Need Your Love So Bad. But while the album itself bottled the band\u2019s on-stage energy, it flagged song-wise. Still, the first peek into the darker side of Green\u2019s psyche came on Trying So Hard To Forget: \u2018I can\u2019t stop my mind wandering back to when I was a downtrodden kid,\u2019 he sang. \u2018\u2026I would spend most of my days running and hiding from the world outside.\u2019<\/p>\n

Fleetwood maintains that Green was haunted by the discrimination he\u2019d experienced as a child. \u201cHe was an East End lad with a chip on his shoulder \u2013 a Jewish boy who got beaten up,\u201d the drummer said in 1997. Green won\u2019t elaborate. \u201cIt [childhood] wasn\u2019t as bad as all that,\u201d he says. \u201cIt wasn\u2019t terrible.\u201d<\/p>\n

He may have felt downtrodden in his youth, but as a bandleader, Green had a clear idea of what he wanted. \u201cHe was incredibly ambitious,\u201d Mick Fleetwood has said. But while the drummer and John McVie fell into line, Spencer was reluctant to follow Green\u2019s instructions. \u201cPeter would invite me to the studio with parts mapped out for me,\u201d he says. \u201cBut I thought he should just go ahead and do them himself.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s because Jeremy didn\u2019t like to be told what to do,\u201d Green laughs. \u201cHe\u2019d say: \u2018Last time I was told that, I was at school!\u2019 Jeremy wouldn\u2019t play on my tunes, and I don\u2019t know why.\u201d<\/p>\n

Spencer: \u201cIn hindsight, I should have been more accommodating.\u201d<\/p>\n

Although Spencer was now distancing himself in the studio, on stage he was a vital part of the show, with his bawdy jokes and impersonations of other pop stars. His attitude in the studio partly drove Green\u2019s decision to bring in a third guitarist. Eighteen-year-old South Londoner Danny Kirwan was another Mike Vernon discovery. \u201cDanny was a fabulous guitarist,\u201d recalls Green. Whereas Spencer stayed out of Green\u2019s songs, Kirwan wanted to get involved. Fleetwood Mac\u2019s sound expanded for the better.<\/p>\n

Fleetwood Mac – Man Of The World – 2nd version (1969) – YouTube
\n\"Fleetwood<\/p>\n

Watch On <\/a><\/p>\n

Despite his new recruit, Green played all the guitar parts on the band\u2019s1969 single Albatross. The slow, almost ambient instrumental broke Fleetwood Mac out of the blues ghetto and on to daytime radio. Purists winced as their favourite band went to No.1. At the time, the group were touring America. Fleetwood says: \u201cWhen we came back it was all over the music papers: \u2018They\u2019ve sold out!\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

But they also returned having tried LSD for the first time in New York. It was a watershed moment for Peter Green. The single, Man Of The World, reached No.2. This plaintive song is impossible to listen to without wondering how much lyrics such as \u2018I wish I\u2019d never been born\u2019 related to their composer\u2019s troubled frame of mind.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe solo part is nice,\u201d Green says now. \u201cThe instrumental break with the slide, in the Hank Marvin style, I thought was good.\u201d And the lyrics? \u201cIt\u2019s very corny in a way.\u201d<\/p>\n

He smiles and takes a sip of tea. Green talking down his talent is an occupational hazard for any interviewer, but there\u2019s none of the false modesty most musicians have when dismissing their best work. Discussing the same song in 1969, Green said: \u201cWords get in the way. The music is a more precise way of telling someone something.\u201d<\/p>\n

For Mick Fleetwood, though, Man Of The World was clearly \u201ca cry for help\u201d.<\/p>\n

In early 1969, Green got a chance to live out his blues fantasies when the band took part in a jam-come-recording session with Otis Spann, Willie Dixon, Buddy Guy and David Honeyboy Edwards at the Chess Records studios in Chicago. But by the spring, as Fleetwood Mac worked on their third album, Then Play On, Green seemed to be in the grip of an identity crisis. As the 60s drew to an end, many pop musicians were seeking spiritual enlightenment. The Beatles had dipped into the teachings of the Indian guru Maharashi Mahesh Yogi, while The Who\u2019s Pete Townshend had become a disciple of Meher Baba. Green now renounced Judaism and converted to Christianity. He grew his beard long and began wearing robes and a crucifix on stage.<\/p>\n

Talking about his conversion now, Green\u2019s eyes twinkle: \u201cIt\u2019s a fantastic feeling. You bubble with it. All your problems are nowhere to be seen.\u201d But a stipulation of his conversion was spreading the word of Jesus to people in the street. Easier said than done. \u201cI think it was a soldier first of all, in Denmark,\u201d he grins. \u201cHe went by, and I said something to him about Jesus. You\u2019re stumbling at first. But then a chap went by in a suit, a city gent, and he slaughtered me.\u201d He starts laughing. \u201cHe knocked it out of me. I can\u2019t remember what he said, but I didn\u2019t bother again.\u201d<\/p>\n

For Green\u2019s bandmates, though, there was another, bigger, problem. \u201cI decided to leave,\u201d he says. \u201cI bought a cello. I was going to learn cello. But the managers came to me and said: \u2018Stay on for the boys, cos they\u2019ve got families\u2026 and you\u2019re doing so well writing the hits, so it would help.\u2019 So I stayed on.\u201d<\/p>\n

Then Play On, released in September 1969, was their first record for major label Warner Bros. The writing was split between Green and Danny Kirwan. The latter\u2019s choirboy voice contrasted with Green\u2019s world-weary vocals. Their weaving guitars on Coming Your Way were a blueprint for twin-guitar rock bands such as Wishbone Ash. On Closing My Eyes Green sang the haunting line: \u2018Some day I\u2019ll die, and maybe then I\u2019ll be with you.\u2019 He told interviewers that it addressed the comedown from his failed attempt to convert to Christianity.<\/p>\n

The album\u2019s most startling feature, though, was its ambition. It wasn\u2019t pure blues, but it was Peter Green\u2019s blues: fusing Chicago with London; shades of English folk, Jewish and African rhythms. Whatever turmoil the guitarist was experiencing, he was, says Fleetwood, \u201cdetermined to push the band forward\u201d. And never more so than on the album\u2019s centerpiece, Oh Well. The nine-minute composition was a masterclass in dynamics: a jabbing riff segued into a mini-symphony filled with Spaghetti Western guitars, orchestral drums and Green\u2019s new discovery, the cello. Oh Well was split in half and released as two sides of the next single. It gave them their third top-five hit in less than a year. Fleetwood Mac appeared on Top Of The Pops, with Green singing about God and confusing the teenyboppers with his mad monk\u2019s beard and gown.<\/p>\n

Back on tour, in March 1970 Fleetwood Mac flew to Munich for a gig. They were met at the airport by delegates from the High-Fish Commune, a left-wing collective preaching free love and drugs. Green was smitten. \u201cOne of the girls was very attractive, a very famous model. Clifford [Davis, Mac\u2019s manager] was very hurt when I walked off with them.\u201d The model was Uschi Obermaier, a pin-up and actress who went on to have a long-running affair with Keith Richards.<\/p>\n

Mac\u2019s roadie Dennis Keane, who accompanied Green to the commune, later claimed they both had their drinks spiked with LSD. The commune\u2019s leader later admitted inviting Green so they could get a message to the Rolling Stones. Fleetwood thinks Green stayed at High-Fish for three days. When they finally persuaded him out for the night\u2019s gig, he was still tripping on acid. On stage, his playing became increasingly unhinged. \u201cI did this thing with my guitar which made it sound like an air-raid siren,\u201d he recalls. \u201cI said to Mick: \u2018What did you think of my playing?\u2019 He said: \u2018You were mad tonight\u2026 mad.\u2019\u201d He breaks off, laughing.<\/p>\n

For many, Green\u2019s spell in the commune was a tipping point in his mental decline. Back in England, he told the band that he wanted to give away all of his money. \u201cSome of it, not all of it,\u201d he corrects. Ever sensitive, he had apparently been moved to tears by TV footage of the recent famine in Biafra. \u201cI just wanted to make a contribution. They [the band] thought I wanted to give it all away, but I wanted them to do it as well.\u201d Green wrote cheques for large sums to a number of charities; the rest of the group and their management were reluctant to do the same. But the guitarist\u2019s messianic vision persisted.<\/p>\n

One night after a drug-induced dream, Green began work on a new song. With its sabre-rattling riff and Hammer Horror imagery, The Green Manalishi (With The Two-Pronged Crown) suggested a mythical beast of the kind that stalked Black Sabbath\u2019s just-released first album. For its composer, though, \u2018the green manalishi\u2019 was a symbol for money. Released as a single, it went Top 10 in May. Perversely, a song about the evils of money was about to make its composer even more of it.<\/p>\n

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\"Fleetwood\n<\/p>\n

Fleetwood Mac in 1969, with guitarist Danny Kirwan (front left) (Image credit: Chris Walter\/Getty)<\/p>\n

That summer, Green finally quit Fleetwood Mac. Fleetwood says: \u201cHe was good about it. He told us what he was going to do.\u201d In August, the band announced his replacement: ex-Chicken Shack keyboard player and John McVie\u2019s wife Christine Perfect.<\/p>\n

Why did he leave? Green reacts to the question as if he\u2019s never been asked it before. \u201cI don\u2019t know,\u201d he shrugs. \u201cI probably could remember if I tried\u2026 Let me see\u2026 I wanted to be free or something.\u201d At the time, Mick Fleetwood explained that Peter \u201cwanted to be just Peter Green. Not Peter Green of Fleetwood Mac.\u201d<\/p>\n

After his departure, Green recorded an improvised solo album, 1970\u2019s The End Of The Game, and went to the US to spend time at Goddard Free College in Vermont, \u201cjust to hang out and do whatever I like\u201d. Surrounded by beautiful girls, he took a hit of LSD. \u201cBut I still haven\u2019t returned from that. You\u2019re not allowed to return.\u201d He hesitates. \u201cIt\u2019s like someone\u2019s playing with you.\u201d<\/p>\n

Back in England, he carried on living with his parents in the house he\u2019d bought in suburban Surrey, occasionally jamming with other musicians and telling the press that there had been \u201cno challenge\u201d in remaining with Fleetwood Mac. When Spencer quit the band in 1971, Green stood in for a few US shows. But the albums the group were making without him \u2013 1970\u2019s Kiln House and the following year\u2019s Future Games \u2013 held little appeal. \u201cI couldn\u2019t identify with it,\u201d he says. \u201cIt wasn\u2019t blues, was it?\u201d<\/p>\n

According to Green, he took LSD once more after Vermont. \u201cIt was in Surbiton. I listened to Donny Hathaway all night long. It was a beautiful night.\u201d But the experience left him \u201chalfway between this\u201d \u2013 he holds his hands apart in the air as if gesturing towards something unseen \u2013 \u201cand that. And that\u2019s no good.\u201d<\/p>\n

Some close to Green maintain that LSD was the trigger rather than the cause of his problems. \u201cI think there has been a bit too much blame put on it,\u201d says Jeremy Spencer. \u201cUnfortunate mental afflictions have been around for centuries before the existence of drugs.\u201d In the mid-70s, Green was diagnosed with schizophrenia.<\/p>\n

As he disappeared from public view, the band he started were becoming one of the biggest in the world. Did he ever listen to Fleetwood Mac\u2019s Rumours? \u201cYeah, I like Rumours. Just as well. It sold about 22 million \u2013 just last week,\u201d he chuckles.<\/p>\n

The contrast between Mick Fleetwood\u2019s and Peter Green\u2019s lives since 1970 is not lost on the man whom Green spared from a job as a window cleaner. Interviewed in 1997, when Fleetwood was touring the re-formed Rumours-era band around the US, the drummer told me that he \u201cwanted to help Peter in any way I can\u201d. The air of unresolved business \u2013 even guilt \u2013 was palpable.<\/p>\n

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\"Peter\n<\/p>\n

Peter Green onstage in 2001 (Image credit: Larry Hulst\/Michael Ochs Archives\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n

You can still hear Peter Green\u2019s blues in the music of Led Zeppelin, Gary Moore, Black Crowes, Rory Gallagher and Brian May, to name a few. In 1978, Judas Priest covered The Green Manalishi and turned it into the heavy metal<\/a> song it always threatened to be. Green\u2019s style of guitar playing \u2013 the sustained notes, the trembling vibrato \u2013 has inspired hundreds of guitarists. The man who never wanted to be in competition with Eric Clapton has been described by Clapton as \u201ca truly phenomenal player\u201d; more recently, Oasis\u2019s Noel Gallagher has cited Fleetwood Mac\u2019s reluctant frontman as one of his favourite singers from the 60s.<\/p>\n

After a stint of recording in the 1990s and a 2009 tour billed as Peter Green And Friends, Green spends most of his time now at home, listening to the radio and his vast collection of CDs. He still plays with the members of the Peter Green And Friends line-up, but only in a rehearsal studio; there are no current plans for gigs or tours. Often, when he\u2019s on his own, he picks up the guitar and puts on a recording of his music. \u201cI play along to Peter Green And Friends,\u201d he smiles.\u201d I sit on the couch \u2013 with a speaker here and a speaker there \u2013 and I play along with it.\u201d He pauses and offers another fleeting pop-star smile. \u201cNobody\u2019s watching me, so I can\u2019t go wrong.\u201d<\/p>\n

Originally published in Classic Rock issue 174, July 2012<\/p>\n

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