Peter Green was the driving force behind the foundation of Fleetwood Mac, which was sometimes known in its early days as 'Peter Green's Fleetwood Mac'.
Wikipedia tells us that after Aynsley Dunbar left to form his own band and was replaced by Mick Fleetwood, John Mayall's Bluesbreakers consisted (as well as Mayall himself) of Peter Green (guitar), John McVie (bass guitar) and Mick Fleetwood (drums). Given free recording time by Mayall ("as a gift", Wikipedia notes somewhat pointedly), Green recorded five tracks along with Fleetwood and McVie. The fifth track was an instrumental, which the naturally self–effacing Green named after the rhythm section: Fleetwood Mac.
Soon after this, Green suggested to Fleetwood (who had already been fired by Mayall, accoring to Wikipedia) that they form a new band. They wanted McVie on bass, and named the band 'Fleetwood Mac' as an incentive to him, but McVie opted to keep his steady income with Mayall rather than take a risk with a new band. Green advertised in Melody Maker for a bass guitarist, as a result of which Bob Brunning joined the band on the understanding that he would leave if McVie agreed to join.
Green was keen to recruit a second guitarist, to divert some of the spotlight away from himself. Fleetwood Mac's producer, Mike Vernon, told Green of an "amazing slide guitarist' named Jeremy Spencer, that he had discovered while searching for new bands to add to the label's roster. After listening to a demo tape, Green went to watch Spencer perform at a gig, and informed him that he was a member of Fleetwood Mac.
The band made its debut on 13 August 1967, at the Windsor Jazz and Blues Festival, as 'Peter Green's Fleetwood Mac'. Within weeks John McVie agreed to join, having become disillusioned with the direction in which Mayall was taking the Bluesbreakers.
Their debut album, released in February 1968, was a mixture of blues covers and original songs by Green and Spencer. Its cover is prominently labelled 'Fleetwood Mac', but bears the alternative title 'Peter Green's Fleetwood Mac' more discreetly near the bottom.
The first album reached No. 4 in the UK charts. Its follow–up, Mr. Wonderful, featured Christine Perfect – then a member of Chicken Shack – on keyboards. It peaked at No. 10.
Following the release of Mr. Wonderful, Peter Green came across a London–based blues trio named Boilerhouse. He was so impressed that he invited them to play support slots for Fleetwood Mac. This would have meant Boilerhouse turning professional, but the bass guitarist and drummer were not prepared to take this step. Green attempted to recruit an alternative rhythm section for the 18–year–old guitarist, Danny Kirwan, but failed to find anyone he considered good enough. So he invited Kirwan to join Fleetwood Mac as a third guitarist.
In April 1969 the band released a single entitled Man of the World – a song written by Green. The protagonist was a man who might appear to have everything, but lacked "a good woman / to make me feel like a good man should." It was around this time that Green's bandmates began to notice changes in his state of mind. He was taking large doses of LSD, grew a beard and began to wear robes and a crucifix. Mick Fleetwood recalled that Green "was obsessive about us not making money, wanting us to give it all away. And I'd say, 'Well you can do it, I don't wanna do that, and that doesn't make me a bad person.'"
The third album, entitled Then Play On, was released in September 1969. It reached No. 6 in the UK, and also made an appearance in the US charts – at No. 109. It was followed in April 1970 by another hit single: The Green Manalishi (with the Two Prong Crown). This song was also written by Peter Green, who has always maintained that it was about money, as represented by the devil. He was descending ever deeper into drug dependency, and his mental health was in decline. He eventually left Fleetwood Mac in May 1970.
The remaining members – including guitarists Jeremy Spencer and Danny Kirwan – began to steer the band away from blues and towards more mainstream rock. Christine Perfect, who by now was married to John McVie, accepted an invitation to join (having previously retired from the music business, after the demise of Chicken Shack and one unsuccessful solo album).
The early 1970s proved to be a difficult time for Fleetwood Mac. Jeremy Spencer literally walked out in February 1971, and was later found to have joined a religious group named the Children of God. Bob Welch, a struggling American guitarist and songwriter who was living in Paris at the time, was recruited – mainly on the recommendation of a mutual friend – in his place.
In August 1972, Danny Kirwan was fired after a massive tantrum following an argument with Welch (in which he trashed a dressing room, banged his head against the back wall of the stage, spattering it with blood, and destroyed his priceless Gibson Les Paul guitar).
The band then recruited guitarist Bob Weston and vocalist Dave Walker, formerly of Savoy Brown and Idle Race respectively. Walker lasted only a few months before being fired, and after Fleetwood discovered that Weston had an affair with his wife Jenny (sister of Pattie Boyd), Weston suffered the same fate.
Although the band's UK album sales were steadily decreasing at this time, Welch's songs were getting plenty of airplay in the United States and their popularity on that side of the Atlantic was rising steadily. But Bob Welch was himself affected by the endless touring and legal disputes (not least with the band's manager, Clifford Davis, who claimed that he owned the name Fleetwood Mac and assembled his own 'alternative' band to tour under that name). Welch left in December 1975.
In his search for a replacement, Mick Fleetwood came across a track entitled Frozen Love, by an American "folk rock" duo named Lindsey Buckingham and Stevie Nicks. He invited Buckingham to join Fleetwood Mac, but Buckingham only agreed to join on the condition that Nicks (his romantic as well as musical partner) could be in the band too.
And the rest ... is history.
Meanwhile ... after leaving Fleetwood Mac, Peter Green appeared at the Bath Festival of Blues and Progressive Music (on 27 June 1970) along with John Mayall, Rod Mayall (organ), Ric Grech (bass) and Aynsley Dunbar (drums). He rejoined Fleetwood Mac briefly, as a temporary replacement for Jeremy Spencer, performing under the pseudonym Peter Blue. But his mental health continued to decline, and he was eventually diagnosed with schizophrenia. During the mid–1970s he spent time in psychiatric hospitals, undergoing electroconvulsive therapy. Many sources attest to his lethargic, trancelike state during this period.
In 1977, just as Fleetwood Mac began to attain heights that the band had never even aspired to under his direction, Green was arrested for threatening his accountant David Simmons with a shotgun. The exact circumstances are the subject of much speculation, the most famous being that Green wanted Simmons to stop sending him money.
In the late 1970s Green began to resume performing. He made an uncredited appearance on Fleetwood Mac's double album Tusk, released in 1979; he also contributed to Mick Fleetwod's 1981 solo album The Visitor, as well as albums by other artists including Ray Dorset (formerly of Mungo Jerry) and Vincent Crane (of the Crazy World of Arthur Brown, and Atomic Rooster).
By this time however it was looking unlikely that Peter Green would ever re–emerge as a major musical artiste. In 1988 he was quoted as saying: "I'm at present recuperating from treatment for taking drugs. It was drugs that influenced me a lot. I took more than I intended to. I took LSD eight or nine times. The effect of that stuff lasts so long ... I wanted to give away all my money ... I went kind of holy – no, not holy – religious. I thought I could do it, I thought I was all right on drugs. My failing!"
© Macclesfield Quiz League 2018