Customer Reviews

The End Of The Game

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(6)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

...there might be a planet where radio stations play great music. Until we find that planet, you'll have to check out CD's and other media.

"The End Of The Game" is Peter Green's foray into something that is truly genre bending. Is it Jazz? Rock? Blues? Is it Ambient music? Or is it variations on Folk melodies? It's a bit of all of the above, and the terms "mind expanding", or "stunning" come to mind upon listening.

The expansive musical exploration suggests why Peter Green and his former bandmates in Fleetwood Mac evenutally parted company. Fleetwood Mac wanted to play more traditional and familiar blues variations and rock tunes, while Green seems as if he wanted to fuse the improvisations of Jazz/rock musicians like Frank Zappa and John McLaughlin, with the blues of early John Mayall and Jimi Hendrix at his peak.

The music here is wordless, and it is as compelling as anything released by the likes of John Coltrane or Miles Davis. Because it is not easily classified as to musical type (rock, blues, or jazz are all equally applicable), it is not "radio friendly", and probably doesn't fit into any pop or other contemporary radio formula--so don't expect to hear it on most stations.

"The End Of the Game" is probably a bit too "far out" for many listeners' tastes, like most of the output by the aforementioned jazz legends. Like a lot of jazz and ambient music, this is not a collection of catchy melodies and clever hooks. Unlike a lot of avant-garde music, though, this stays based in blues chord and rhythmic strucutes and never drifts into the "wierdness for the sake of wierdness" realm that ultimately sinks most expermimental music.

Of Green's subsequent CD's, only "In The Skies" even comes close to this. While I liked the songs, rhythms, and melodies on "In The Skies", it left me with none of the sense of exploration and adventure that this CD does.

This CD holds up well to many repeat listenings, and all but demands to be digitally remastered.

If you are looking for the conventional Original Fleetwood Mac or traditional blues, Don't buy this album.(Get Live at the BBC instead) If you are interested in the raw essence of music and the soul exposed via electricity, Don't pass this one by.. Truly incredible. Peter Green playing at his prime. Goes way beyond words. Everytime I listen to this album I hear something new. I own over 2000 albums and CDs, If I had to choose just one, It would be this one. "Professional Reviewers" that constantly hang a bad grade on this album should stick to Donny Osmond or the Beegees. "It aint for the faint of heart!" Consider yourself a flashy guitarist?? Prepare to be horribly humbled.

I normally avoid instumental guitar albums like the plague, but being a Peter Green die-hard I had to pick this up back in 1970. I did'nt really care for it then but I love it now! No other guitarist had the burning tone of Peter Green. Some were faster, some more skilled technically, but no one was as expressive with the six strings as Peter Green. This CD is kinda short. You'll wade through a few boring moments in the jamming, but the rewards are far greater than the downside. Five stars for a incindiery talent who never burnt out. Fans of The Mac, fans from Peter's recent and welcome return to form, and fans of red hot and blue guitar need this one.

Peter Green, fresh from his late-1960's endeavors with Fleetwood Mac, offered up his first solo album in 1970, something akin to George Harrison's 'Wonderwall' or Neil Young's 'Arc', a thirty-five minute series of instrumental works ranging in length from under two and one-half minutes (the aptly named 'Timeless Time') to the lengthy opener, the nine-minute workout on the wah-pedal titled 'Bottoms Up'. While the production and writing credits are all assigned to Green, each track was culled from a single six-hour improvisational session featuring Green and four other musicians.

This disc comes as sparsely packaged as just about any you will see. The German import lists only one date, 1979, although the disc was originally released on vinyl in 1970. Three times the track listings are offered, but nowhere are the running times provided. The musicians and their instruments are identified. Other than that there are two photographs of a cheetah and a bar code. That's it. What's more, the song titles offer basically no insight into the texture of the compositions, which is fitting since they pretty much defy description. You will notice that fully one-half of the front insert is completely blank, so I guess we can claim that lyrics are included!

Perhaps the most instructive insight into the disc can be gained by investigating the backgrounds of the relatively unknown, but not unaccomplished musicians Green is performing with. All possess fairly lengthy resumes, with most of their touchstones on the radical cusp of recorded music. Bassist Alex Dmochowski, for instance, performed on several of Frank Zappa's studio discs from the early 1970's, and also recorded a disc with Anysley Dunbar. Keyboardist Zoot Money had stints with Spencer Davis, Alex Korner, Andy Summers, and even Eric Burdon's New Animals. Nick Buck on organ was a member of Hot Tuna, and drummer Godfrey MacLean was a member of Brian Auger's Oblivion Express, and recorded with Lou Reed. Out of this group one could certainly expect an eclectic mix of jazz, blues, rock, as well as the experimental rhythms and moods they create.

The most conventional of the six tracks is the funky, pulsing opener, 'Bottoms Up', which also features Green's most impressive guitar lines. The wah-pedal, which Green indulges in throughout the disc, lends a psychedelic impression over all the other musical textures the band explores. 'Timeless Time' follows, a slow, whispy, and brief interlude, marking time between the conventional and unconventional, which breaks loose on track three. 'Descending Scale' is another lengthy track, running about eight minutes, the first six of which are perhaps the most unstructured in the set. With each instrument seemingly pursuing its own course, it is surprising the finished product sounds as coherant and cohesive as it does. The last two minutes of the track, however, follow the rhythm section to a more standard conclusion. The last three tracks run about five, four, and six minutes respectively. 'Burnt Foot' features a nice drum solo, and a sweet rock jam with pulsing bass lines. 'Hidden Depth' is another many-textured track, including one soft, flowing segment. The title track closes out the disc, sounding like an aural summary paragraph for the disc, experienced as a cosmic journey.

Recordings such as 'End of the Game' obviously are not going to elicit widespread popular interest. The fact that Warner Brothers chose to release the disc speaks partly to the musical sensibilities of the time, which was a fertile ground for experimental exploits of this sort. It also speaks to the accomplished status Peter Green had achieved as the prime componant in one of the seminal blues-rock bands of the era, especially from a European perspective. No surprise therefore, that 'End of the Game' exists only as an imported product. If you're a fan of the 1960's work of Peter Green and Fleetwood Mac, or if you just enjoy experimental music, this disc qualifies as essential listening. However, I would doubt that people outside of those categories would have much use for what Peter Green and company are doling out here.

As another reviewer pointed out, this album is really a jazz-rock fusion album, in keeping with Miles Davis's 1970-1975 work. That's my favorite Davis period, so I had no trouble at all connecting with this album when I bought it several years ago.

I think I prefer Green's editing to Teo Macero's, though. Rather than splicing jam sections together (cf. "Jack Johnson"), Green seems to have focused on the heart of each jam and given it a space of its own. I suspect that this would have been a double album had Macero been the producer.

I also prefer Green to John McLaughlin and Pete Cosey (Davis's guitarists)--and any other guitarist, for that matter--because of his sense of time, his touch, and his tone (Carlos Santana owes him millions). His extensive use of the wah-wah pedal makes this album very interesting for Green watchers.

However--and a big "however" this is--if you question the value of Davis's electric period or expect blues or blues-rock or rock or ballads from Peter Green, then you may want to keep your distance from "The End of the Game."

This has got to rate as the single best theme album of all time. An instrumental disc by the famous Peter Green, founder of Fleetwood Mac, it charts a day in the life of a jungle cat. Jazz rythms, percussion and wah-wah guitar elicit a true feeling of the joy of being a big cat, running through the jungle, chasing prey, contemplating your reflection in a still pool, preparing for sleep, and finally, achingly, being killed by a hunter. (Gunshot at end on original vinyl was editted out by some engineer for CD version; sadly)

This is my single favourite album of all time.

Having been a dedicated Fleetwood Mac fan (until they abandoned the blues for pop) I was well aware of Peter Green's reputation and playing. When he dropped out of sight after leaving Mac, many of us wondered when and if he'd reappear. He did - with this all instrumental album. At the time this came out, I was only used to hearing Green play in the context of a song or short jams like "Searching for Madge"/"Fighting for Madge" on "Then Play On," so this album didn't grab me. Even in 1970 at the age of 17 I was getting tired of long 'guitar jam' music, since there was an overabundance of it and most of it frankly sucked.

BUT!............

Once I got past the fact that there was no singing and really started listening to this album, it became aparent that Green wasn't simply noodling. The improvs build and climax and subside nicely. There are, to be honest, places where the mood sags a bit, but this is easily overlooked and balanced out by the (many)places where Green's playing catches fire. When he's on - which is often here - he's really on. What Clapton took ten notes to say, Green could say with one or two, which often led to him being overlooked by those addicted to the flashier playing of Clapton, Hendrix, Page, Beck, etc. But make no mistake, this is a ROCK SOLID album and well worth the price.

Reviews of this album are, to say the least, all over the map. If in fact you're expecting Over My Head or Rhinannon or even Black Magic Woman, then you've come to the wrong place. End game marked Peter Green's first solo effort and came out sometime around Then Play On, his last studio recording with FM. That said, this is primarily free-form jazz guitar improvisation, along the lines of Hendrix meets Mahavishnu John McLaughlin. Warning!!!!Not for the faint of heart or the noninitiated.

recorded in 1970, green was considering leaving fleetwood mac when he released this bold instrumental album. i believe the album title even refers to his doubts about staying with the band. i believe he wanted to aim more in this direction, while FM wanted to stay more in the rock/pop vain, hoping to gain the popularity that had eluded them up to that point. whatever was going on in green's head, this was a bold album at the time.....entirely instrumental....some of it good strong rocking jams featuring green's sterling guitar prowess....some of it kind of wandering, rambling improv where the group of musicians assembled get a little spacy and experimental. the album's a bit short, clocking in at just under 35 minutes, but the music is a deliciously daring and individual mix of rocking jams and spacy meandering jams that can get inside your mind if you're willing to take the ride peter green invites you to take....there is no fare.......there is no unfair......this is just a collection of instrumental tunes that peter green was willing to explore....it's a journey that fleetwood mac didn't want to make......but that's no reason why you shouldn't climb aboard, strap yourself in and remain seated until the ride comes to a complete stop. the ride you take may excite, incite and/or confuse you.....but if you are brave and open, you'll want to ride again!

Be forewarned, if you're still somewhat new to Peter Green and your journey began with his incandescent blues (with John Mayall's Blues Breakers; with the original Fleetwood Mac; with his brief late-1970s/early-1980s return; in his career since 1995), that this isn't the Green God whose reputation as perhaps the finest, and certainly the most lyrical British blues guitarist (which is saying something considering Eric Clapton was his Blues Breakers predecessor and his peer, until his Fleetwood Mac departure and swelling mental problems) of the breed. Instead of solid songwriting and Green's customary lyricism, this is a set of almost entirely-meandering jams.

A jam album featuring Green wouldn't have been a terrible idea on paper; the last months of Green's Fleetwood Mac showed that aggregation becoming a capable jam outfit (just catch onto any live recording of "Rattlesnake Shake" or "The Green Manalishi" for the evidence, not to mention the extensions of "Black Magic Woman" they were wont to perform), and Green himself seemed to thrive in that environment as readily as he thrived playing his blues. But this isn't a Fleetwood Mac album; these musicians aren't Danny Kirwan, John McVie, and Mick Fleetwood; and, this Peter Green was a psychological mess. It's one thing to acknowledge that he was beginning to think above and beyond the blues box well before he finally did walk out of Fleetwood Mac, but it's something else again to take "The End of the Game" at face value.

The lone exception is the set opener, "Bottoms Up." Here, Green and his cohorts (including his early mentor, Zoot Money) seem to keep each other within a somewhat defined anchorage, letting each other spread but not veer too wildly off the path. It's jarring to hear Green investing as much as he does in the wah-wah pedal; he'd been one of the most singular sounding guitarists on the planet until this, his tone, his economy, his phrasing, and his feeling the envy of many a bluesman black and white alike. But now he's smothering his formidable approach to the instrument in a Hendrixian wash that doesn't always suit him, even if he can still find the lyricism beneath it, something he seemed to know along the way by the manner in which he suddenly drops back and allows the remaining quartet (Money and Nick Buck, keyboards; occasional Frank Zappa cohort Alex Dmochowski, bass; Godfrey Maclean, drums) to jam without him for a spell, before he returns with another round of wah-wah bursts that sound like things Hendrix himself excised from potential finished "Electric Ladyland" takes but don't sound especially terrible, and his musical companions support him sympathetically and tastefully enough, all things considered. Above any other cut on this disturbing set, here is the cut on which the one thing Green seems to have intact is his flair for melodious improvisation and for shepherding a band, however haphazard, through an oddly embracing journey.

The remaining performances (said to have been edited down from a round of long in-studio jams) have a few moments of intrigue, a few other moments of atmospheric music, and a few too damn many moments of a leader in search of a sound and a band in search of its leader. It's not so much unlistenable as it is unsettling and unaffirmative, even if---as the recorded oeuvre of acid casualties goes---this isn't even close to the deconstructive dissembling of most of Syd Barrett's post-Pink Floyd work. The major problem is that Green isn't even sure whether he has something to say, other than how much it was time for a change. That one of the best composers, too, of the British blues movement of the mid-to-late 1960s is reduced to these struggling jams (this can't possibly be the same whole musical mind that once produced "The Super Natural," or "Albatross," or "Black Magic Woman," or "Man of the World," though the fourth of those examples chillingly telegraphs the spinout this album amplifies) testifies even more sadly to what was throttled as Green spun into despair and mental illness during and after this project.

It would take about a decade before he began to find things to say again, and even began returning to his blues roots without merely recycling his old music. Hark to "In the Skies" and "Little Dreamer," on each of which he begins again to sound like the Greeny everyone loved without sounding retro or stunted or meandering, even if he didn't quite sound as bold as before just yet and some of the R and B extractions with which he'd experiment on those albums didn't really suit him as well as his blues and introspective quiet rock did. Then, hark ahead further to his work with Splinter Group and his full-tilt return to the blues, ancient and modern. Today, "The End of the Game" is merely a disturbing (if occasionally fascinating) interlude, but in 1970 it must have sounded to only too many as if Peter Green was going to prove an irretrievably lost soul.