Blues-era Fleetwood Mac revisited at Rotorua gig

One of the many musical highlights of the British blues boom of the 1960s was the formation of a band from London who, for a period in the late 60s, were selling more records than The Beatles and Rolling Stones combined.

Fleetwood Mac was originally formed by Peter Green in 1967 as a vehicle for his wonderful guitar playing and sometimes very personal blues-based songs.

Tomorrow, Rotorua residents get a chance to hear songs from that era performed by the band Manalishi. The band pay tribute to the wonderful blues of early era Fleetwood Mac with a set list that covers the full range of material from that time.

The band are Del Thomas on guitar/harmonica/vocals, Phil McLaughlin on lead guitar, Sean Dolan on bass and James Shanks on drums.

You'll hear music that was performed by Peter Green while still with John Mayall's Bluesbreakers, all the way through to the last songs recorded by Green with Fleetwood Mac.

Vocalist Del Thomas said there's a whole range of blues material to be enjoyed, ranging from straight forward blues shuffles featuring slide guitar in the style of Elmore James, to the complex jazz based Jigsaw Puzzle Blues.

Fleetwood Mac's first few albums were heavily based on the style of the Chicago blues of the late 50s, but their breakthrough into mainstream music happened with the release of Albatross and later when Santana recorded a version of Peter Green's song Black Magic Woman. Later on hits such as Man of the World, Oh Well and Green Manalishi followed, but the band was dogged by various demons and Peter Green eventually left the band in 1970, closely followed by Jeremy Spencer and Danny Kirwan, leaving Mick and Christine Fleetwood and John McVie to soldier on as best they could using various American guitar players.

Fleetwood Mac went on to major commercial success in later years with much more pop-oriented material, but the nucleus of the band has always been the rhythm section of Mick Fleetwood and John McVie.

Manalishi cover the hits of blues era Fleetwood Mac tomorrow night at the Belgian Bar on Arawa St. The band start at 8pm, $15 on the door, or $10 for BOP Blues Club members.