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peter green

the original 59' peter green les paul

peter green in action during old fleetwood mac days

i'm supposed to be doing my 2000 word history essay but i kinda got sidetracked while listening to peter green on john mayall and the bluesbreakers and fleetwood mac, so this shall be a tribute post!

NOT! just gonna go about praising his tone actually. alright fine some brief history of the man (and his guitar) first. peter green got noticed in the music scene after replacing eric clapton in the john mayall and the bluesbreakers band. after playing on a record he moved on to form fleetwood mac, which i'm sure a few of you have heard of. what many don't know about fleetwood mac is that it used to be a blues/rock band, before it defected to pop music when peter green left the band after being diagnosed with schizophrenia due to abuse of LSD.

many cite him as one of the pioneers of blues rock because of his "darker blues" playing style and holy grail les paul tone, though never reaching quite the commercial success of eric clapton and jimmy page. and what's the secret to peter green's tone? well its quite obvious isn't it, knowing my blog...

notice the pickups

his guitar!! actually, the pickups on his guitar. but then again, this subject has been on debate by guitar people all over for a long time, and the world still isn't too sure what it is that gives him his brilliant tone. some say its in the fingers, but i'm just gonna go with his pickups, which are wired out-of-phase (whatever that means) that give his tone the mojo!

peter green used a gibson les paul which he modified in 1967, having the neck pickup rewired and reversed. also, peter green used to be gary moore's mentor, and sold him his gibson later on. so in many gary moore albums, you actually hear his guitar, but gary moore's tone is NOTHING and i repeat NOWHERE near to peter green's. i guess the amps and effects play a role as well. gary moore later sold the guitar for 1.2 million dollars, not sure to who.

download the john mayall and the blues breakers album - a hard road. there are a few tracks where his guitar tone (and playing) really stand out. tracks i'd suggest are dust my blues and so many roads. keep in mind this is british blues, which to some might seem boring/bland. oh and this album has lotsa harmonica stuff as well!

if you're interested, you can get a replica version of the PG (praveen ganesh luls) les paul, pre-aged and with the modified pickups from Vintage guitars. do check out the review as well. the wear doesn't look 100% authentic but what do you expect from a 400 quid made in china guitar? the only downside is they have hardly any dealers outside of england, bummer.

http://rikipu.blogspot.com/2010/06/peter-green.html