Green Manalishi
 

This is my second favorite Peter Green Mac song behind Oh Well. I believe he wrote it with regards to his decent into madness because of his acid use. I wanted to ask the experts this: I've heard the infamous story about how they were on tour in Germany and some rich kids got ahold of Pete, and he ended up doing acid. I assume he wrote GM after this? I also love John's response heh asked about this subject when he said he would love to get his hands on those people for ruining a great career. You could see how pissed John was just reading the words.

David, "The Green Manalishi" was written considerably before the 3/70 Munich incident. The first live recording I can see listed for the song was in 11/69.

Peter Green had experimented with acid for awhile before Munich - it's not like that was his first time. Martin Celmins' biography of Peter goes into what (probably) happened in Munich in some detail - I'd recommend you pick up a copy if you're interested in Peter's music. While I'm not convinced of the accuracy of everything in the book, I do think he does a good job of exploding a couple of myths about Peter's history - the Munich incident and the shotgun incident in particular. And if I recall correctly, the book gives Peter's account of how he wrote "The Green Manalishi" as well.

And I think "descent into madness because of his acid use" is not an accurate description of what happened to Peter either. I'm not sure that anyone really knows exactly the cause of his mental illness, although I've read that he may well have had a latent schizophrenia that could have been brought out both by his acid use and by the stress he was under at the time. And I've certainly read that the treatments he was given for his condition most likely made things worse rather than better.

By the way, I also love "The Green Manalishi", especially Peter's guitar work at the end of the song - some of his most original and expressive playing IMHO.

And, on those extended live versions, his six-string bass solos are pretty creative. (Up until about 6 years ago, I'd thought those solos were by John McVie)

And this is not the first PG song where the guitar playing really starts to rock on the fade out - Before the Beginning on Then Play On is another example where you want to hear where his guitar is going

C

Yes, as Sharksfan says, Manalishi was written way before the Munich incident. The first documented live version (if the date is correct) is from November, 1969. Peter wrote it after a nightmare, and the "green" refers to
money - green dollar bills. Apparently Johnny Winter played on the studio version, but they left him out in the final mix.

And Greeny didn't turn into a wreck after Munich, listen to the live tapes from afterwards, and The end of the game. Or anything he played on during the early 70's! But off course LSD is known to trigger latent schizophrenia, so anyone who is fragile to begin with should never try that drug. Maybe Peter might have been able to keep things together had he stayed off drugs, but he obviously didn't enjoy the rock star live anyway?

I'm not sure if this makes any difference, but the studio recording of Manalishi was made after Peter's Munich experience, in April 1970, at a session along with 'World In Harmony'. As I say though, I'm not sure that the structure of the recorded version is wildly different from the live versions performed before the LSD thing, apart from the 6-string bass solo etc.

Very true, dino. And although I don't detect any really major changes in those live performances from before to after the band's stop in Munich, it might be of significance that it was only afterwards that they started performing "Underway" separately from the "Rattlesnake Shake/Madge" jam during their live shows (although they were combined again for the 9 April radio show that's included on the Show-Biz Blues 2-disc set). Peter was able to stretch out playing in his newer, looser style on these longer "Underway" performances. I think that might have come regardless - that it was just a development of Peter's evolution as a player at that time. But maybe, having told the band he was leaving, he felt more free to play the way he wanted to, whether or not the rest of the band was willing or able to follow.

Of course I wasn't there so it's all speculation on my part, but I get the impression that what happened in Munich has been blown out of proportion because it was immediately afterwards that Peter told the band he was leaving. But if you read about what was already going on (Martin Celmins, Mick Fleetwood, Dinky Dawson all discuss it in their books), there was already little doubt that it was only a matter of time until Peter left the band. Dawson's account in particular makes it clear that the band wasn't even sure Peter would go on that European tour with them (he'd stayed behind in the US after the rest of the band returned to the UK in February 1970). And Dawson also makes it clear that Peter's personality changes had already become of great concern to the band.

I'm sure that during that European tour the band was hoping against hope that Peter would return to his old self and stay with them, but it became clear to everyone after Munich that those things wouldn't happen. So I think what happened in Munich and immediately afterwards just brought those already well-developed issues to a head, and that's why it's become seen as such a defining moment.

See this is why I come here to this section, to learn new stuff like this. Thank you.:nod: I realize that I dont know everything.