Peter Green

On Sunday April 5th 1998 Ronnie Scott's, the world famous jazz club, was taken over by a blues crowd. Gone was the cool reserve of the jazz buffs and in its place came blues fans set for a raucous good time, and Green fans eager to see how the Fleetwood Mac legend was doing two years into his comeback. The recording includes many of Peter Green's most famous compositions such as 'Albatross', 'Black Magic Woman', 'Rattlesnake Shake', 'The Green Manalishi' and 'The Supernatural', plus versions of other blues classics as 'Travelling Riverside Blues' and 'Steady Rollin' Man'.

This double-disc overview collection of British super guitarist Peter Green. By concentrating on a 20-year period, listeners get a solid selection of Green's creative genius with Fleetwood Mac, his spotty early solo records when his disintegration begins, and his tentative but still brilliant first return to music-making as well as a pair of sideman gigs with Bob Brunning's Sunflower Blues Band tossed in for good measure. There are only two live cuts in the batch, Boston Tea Party-era versions of "Black Magic Woman" and a cover of Duster Bennett's "Jumping at Shadows," and a wildly interspersed series of solo album cuts, Mac singles, and LP grooves like the juxtaposition of Green's "Lost My Love" with FM's "Fast Talking Woman Blues."

Splinter Group/Destiny Road is a remarkably good value for anyone interested in the comeback of Peter Green. Combining the self-titled debut of the Splinter Group along with Destiny Road, this two-fer offers a good snapshot of the man's return. He's not the guitar god he once was, which is only to be expected, really. And the band never sounds as inspired as old Fleetwood Mac. But Splinter Group is very serviceable, with both "Homework" and "The Stumble" comparing favorably against the originals – although it's not always easy to tell which guitar is Green and which is cohort Nigel Watson. Destiny Road, from 1999, showcases a more cohesive unit, and a more relaxed Green. His guitar work still doesn't have the sharpness, nor the unexpected turns of yore, but it's still very pleasant, especially "Madison Blues" and "Hiding in Shadows." In many ways the mere fact that Green was back recording is reward enough. And this time he doesn't sound as tortured by the blues as he was in his heyday.

Fleetwood Mac's debut LP was a highlight of the late-'60s British blues boom. Green's always inspired playing, the capable (if erratic) songwriting, and the general panache of the band as a whole placed them leagues above the overcrowded field…

His career riddled by drug abuse and paranoia, Peter Green is still regarded by some fans as the greatest white blues guitarist ever, Eric Clapton notwithstanding. A 2CD Career retrospective of Peter Green's Fleetwood Mac and his Splinter Group.