Cover Me Up (Peter Green)

Peter Green (270 songs)

As I mention on the Beatles Covers page, I've collected free, legal, on-line covers of Peter Green songs over the years. Early on, many were found at the now-defunct MP3.com. I subsequently discovered the Internet Archive's Live Music Archive. Unfortunately, finding songs credited to Peter Green or even Fleetwood Mac is well nigh impossible, so I've had to search the archive for individual song titles. To make matters worse, there are over 50 versions [when I wrote this many years ago!] of "Black Magic Woman", almost all performed Santana-style. Now, I'm the first to admit that Santana's classic cover is the definitive version of "Black Magic Woman" against which all others, including Peter Green's, will be judged. Still, listening to 50-some versions of Carlos's guitar intro probably hastens the erasure of brain cells.

I confess that I enjoyed the early Fleetwood Mac recordings so much that I didn't expend much brain power on keeping track of who wrote what song. Initially, when putting together this page, I tried to be a little more careful. However, as I've found an increasing number of covers of Fleetwood Mac covers, I've loosened up and allowed in non-Greeny songs. I'm a little leery of Little Willie John's "Need Your Love So Bad" because I hadn't followed Eric Clapton's career closely since Derek and The Dominos and I didn't realize he had released his own version of the song, which was likely inspiring more covers than Peter Green's incredible version.

A special song in the bunch is not a cover: "Peter Green" is a folk song (blues ballad?) about Peter Green. I originally attributed this song to George Wilson, whose ReverbNation version includes the full lyrics of the song. However, I recently learned that the author was actually the late Ron Trueman-Border, who passed away mere days after Peter Green himself in 2020. Ron's studio recording of the song appeared on his 1997 album, Unrequited; you can listen to the track at SoundCloud. Also see this 2012 live performance of the song by George Wilson (!) and Ron Trueman-Border, as well as a more recent, more intimate, solo performance by Ron. Again, the complete lyrics are accessible from George Wilson's ReverbNation song page, but here's one verse to give you a taste of it:

Now he talks a little funny and he acts a little strange
But I believe that love still burns and some things never change
When he's walking in the wilderness, waking from a dream
Who'll play the blues for Peter Green?

Although some of the MP3s are no longer available on-line, I do have copies of everything.