Peter Green Splinter Group

Peter Green Splinter Group With Nigel Watson - Hot Foot Powder - 2000 - Snapper

This great album contains 13 remarkably fresh covers of some classic blues songs written by Robert Johnson, including the title track. Green is a brilliant rock guitarist whose admiration for Johnson's material is well known in popular music circles. "Hot Foot Powder" iis his second collection of material from the Robert Johnson songbook. An excellent recording.

TRACKS (All titles composed by Robert Johnson)

1. I'm A Steady Rollin' Man
2. From Four Until Late
3. Dead Shrimp Blues
4. Little Queen Of Spades
5. They're Red Hot
6. Preachin' Blues
7. Hell Hound On My Trail
8. Travelling Riverside Blues
9. Malted Milk
10. Milkcow's Calf Blues
11. Drunken Hearted Man
12. Cross Road Blues
13. Come On In My Kitchen

PERSONNEL

Brian Bull - Guitar (Tracks 2,5)
Roger Cotton - Guitar, Piano
Dr John - Piano (Tracks 2,5)
Honey Boy Edwards - Guitar (Track 8)
Peter Green - Guitar, Vocals, Harmonica
Buddy Guy - Guitar (Track 12)
Otis Rush - Guitar (Tracks 1,4)
Peter Stroud - Upright Bass
Hubert Sumlin - Guitar (Track 3)
Larry Tolfree - Drums
Joe Louis Walker - Guitar (Track 8)
Nigel Watson - Guitar, Vocals

Producers - Roger Cotton, Peter Green, Nigel Watson

REVIEWS

Robert Johnson, revered by many as the greatest of bluesmen, gets a second makeover here by Peter Green, rightly considered one of the best blues guitar players ever and, like Johnson, at one time or another shrouded in his fair share of mystery and speculation. Together with a clutch of veteran blues musicians, Green, Nigel Watson and the Splinter Group pay 13 loving tributes to Delta bluesman Johnson whose compositions have graced the repertoire of rock and blues bands ever since Clapton first tried to flag a ride down at the crossroads in 1968. Green takes most of the vocals with Watson singing lead on just four tracks including the frantic "Preachin' Blues" and the doom-laden "Hellhound On My Trail" (once recorded in 1968 by Peter Green's Fleetwood Mac). Dr. John helps out on "From Four Until Late" with some trademark barrelhouse piano. That's him too swinging behind a foot-tapping version of "They're Red Hot." A worthy follow-up to the much acclaimed ROBERT JOHNSON SONGBOOK, HOT FOOT POWDER (incidentally a voodoo spell ingredient mentioned in "Hellhoundà") shows the Splinter Group paying another sincere tribute to one of the most influential blues artists of all time. © 1996 - 2007 CD Universe
Call me an ignoramus, but I didn't know Peter Green's previous effort, The Robert Johnson Songbook, had won the W.C. Handy Award for Best Comeback Album of the year in 1999. I must have been vacationing on another planet at the time. I can't make any comparisons with the latest from Peter Green with Nigel Watson Splinter Group (what a name!), called Hot Foot Powder (Artisan Recordings), but I can tell you this CD is also worthy of voters' attention. It features the band's arrangements of the remaining 13 Robert Johnson songs that had not been covered on the Songbook, a sort of Robert Johnson Songbook, part 2. Now, everyone knows that Peter Green helped define the sound of electric blues-rock when he was with Fleetwood Mac, but on this CD you won't find interpretations of Robert Johnson's music in a rock format (it's already been done anyway). The idea seems to have been to figure out how Johnson's music must have sounded in his time in a small-band setting. As many blues researchers surmise that Johnson sometimes played with a band, maybe even some early electric guitar, this makes sense. The songs are easily recognizable, with no major changes, only minor details that make you discover those songs again --- a rollicking piano on "They're Red Hot," a double bass played with a bow on "Malted Milk," drums being brushed on "Drunken Hearted Man," etc. Hey, this is Robert Johnson stuff, so I don't have to tell you there are great songs here. Let's just say that "Traveling Riverside Blues," with special guests Joe Louis Walker and Honeyboy Edwards, is an especially blissful moment on an unfailingly excellent record. Cool art work, too. © Mike Simpson © 2000, Blue Night Productions. All rights reserved.

ABOUT PETER GREEN

Widely hailed as Britain’s best-ever blues guitarist, Peter Green inspired B.B. King to say, “He has the sweetest tone I ever heard. He’s the only one who gave me the cold sweats.” Born Peter Greenbaum in 1946, the Londoner made his musical debut in John Mayall’s Bluesbreakers, replacing Eric Clapton (who had left to form Cream) as the band’s lead guitarist in 1966. Green’s unique style blended Hank Marvin’s reverb-drenched twang and B.B. King’s hornlike phrasing. After leaving the Bluesbreakers to found Fleetwood Mac (originally a rootsy blues-rock outfit), Green built up a devoted following with his throaty tones and deft fretwork. In 1971, psychedelic drugs and life on the road took their toll, pushing Green into debilitating mental illness. In the ensuing decades, he recorded a handful of solo and band albums, none of which adequately reflected his former glory. © www.guitarplayer.com/story.asp?storyCode=15277