Page 27 - the NOISE February 2014

subtle rhythm base. The whole album sounds like the lads are having a great time.
Fleetwood Mac become the #1 fave band of Britain’s bluesheads, Clapton’s purism having slowly fallen away beginning with Cream’s inception. The Mac’s next single, al- though technically a blues, points down the road at the hard rock to come, and is Peter Green’s first masterpiece.
“Black Magic Woman” was released in March 1968. It did not chart in America, and only scraped up to #37 in Britain, yet the sin- gle is a quantum leap forward for the band. Green takes the minor key blues form, adds some crystalline leads (somewhere, a young Mark Knopfler was taking notes), lots of re- verb, Mick’s voodoo toms, a few start/stops and a complete tempo shift at the end, and packs it all into 2:50 for a perfect rock & roll single. Santana’s better-known version from two years later may be the one for the ages musically, but Peter Green’s vocal cuts Greg Rolie’s to ribbons every day of the week.
In May through July of 1968, Fleetwood Mac play their first US shows, opening for The Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane, Pink Floyd, and The Who on the west coast. They are a hit with both concertgoers and fellow musicians, and word-of-mouth begins grow- ing in the states.
Up next is “Need Your Love So Bad” in July 1968 and, while not as groundbreaking as the previous single, adds an understated string section to the band’s arsenal of blues twists. Green delivers a fine restrained vocal and some sweet guitar in an arrangement based on B.B. King’s version (B.B. said Peter Green was “the only white guitarist ever
gave me cold sweats”).
Fleetwood Mac’s second album Mr. Won-
derful was released August 1968. The band tries to recreate the loose feel of their debut and almost completely miss the mark. Their performances are under-rehearsed and slop- py, despite two amazing slow Green blues (“Love That Burns” and “Trying So Hard To Forget”). The innovations of the first LP have turned into derivative clichés. Jeremy Spen- cer had already used his “Dust My Broom” slide lick on two previous Mac tracks; here he contributes FOUR more that all start the exact same way, prompting the question, “Didn’t we just hear this song?” among listen- ers. If the first album showed how to advance
the blues form, this one showed its boundar- ies. A serious misstep (really the only one in their catalogue with Green), Mr. Wonderful was not released in the US.
Mr. Wonderful does mark the first ap- pearance on a Fleetwood Mac LP of Brit- ain’s #1 female blues singer/organist of the day, Christine Perfect. Greeny and Mac both fancied her; Mac won. Eventually she would marry McVie, assume his last name, and take a larger role in the development of the band.
Peter Green had bigger ideas beyond the blues. By this time, Green had realized Jer- emy Spencer’s limitations as a musician and voiced his desire to enlist a third guitarist more in tune with his vision. Danny Kirwan, an 18-year old 6-string prodigy, was located and taken under the Green God’s wing to learn from the master. And learn he did. Their first release with Kirwan aboard was unlike anything any of them had played on before.
“Albatross” was released in November 1968, and it’s definitely not the blues. Its roots lie in “Sleepwalk,” a #1 hit for Santo and Johnny in 1959. Mick plays a slow heartbeat pulse with mallets while Mac thuds out the low end like a calm still ocean for Green’s and Kirwan’s bottleneck guitars to slide down into and
swoop back up again. To everyone’s surprise, the instrumental shot to #2 in England. Of course, this was the cue for the blues purists to begin screaming “sellout!” but the tranquil majesty of “Albatross” cannot be denied.
The single was a watershed for Fleetwood Mac. There would still be plenty of blues in their live show but no more would be tack- led in the studio. With one exception.
That exception is the Blues Jam At Chess sessions in January 1969. Upon hearing the famed Chess Studios in Chicago were to be torn down, the band booked several days’ recording there. Unlike the Stones, who had visited in 1964, the Mac invited some of the locals to play. They ended up jamming with Willie Dixon, Otis Spann (Muddy Waters’ piano man), J.T. Brown (Elmore James’ sax player, much to Spencer’s delight), and several others.
By 1969, enough jive white groups had visited the studio hoping a little credibilty would rub off that the Chess men were wary of the boys at first. But Peter Green’s obvious musicianship, along with the band’s enthu- siasm and feel for the music, won them over
Fleetwood Mac, sans Peter Green, circa 1977
>> CoNTiNUeD oN 28 >>
thenoise.us • the NOISE arts & news
• FEBRUARY 2014 • 27