The Jeremy Spencer Imposter
 

In his book, Bob Brunning talks about meeting a Jeremy Spencer imposter.

To be able to pass himself off as JS even for a short time this guy would presumably had to have had a number of attributes: a Midlands accent (which could be faked), a severe lack of height (which couldn't) and if he was playing gigs at least some modicum of ability.

Was anything else ever heard or known about this guy?

I've never heard of this. I knew there was a Peter Green imposter who had lots of guys fooled (including Queen's bassist).

Never heard of this. Can you give som more information??????

BB's book is currently out on loan from the library where I borrowed it, and this library's on-line catalogue doesn't show when it is due back like others do.

From memory, this guy was playing gigs (in Europe?) as JS, BB met with him and actually took JS's parents along to a show.

BB mentions a PG impersonator, but this was just some guy in a pub using his likeness to get free drinks. When confonted he confessed and shot off. I hadn't heard of anyone playing gigs as PG.

Really? when was that guy making the rounds?

I want to say it was around 1994/1995. What's weird is after this guy was proven to be a fraud, there were rumors about Peter Green's passing. Within a few months, not only was Pete still living, but had started performing again. It was a weird period, but then what's new?

Yeah, as I remember that's about the time he came out of his fog.

The Spencer fake is an interesting story - Brunning talks about it briefly. He says that in the early 1980s he begn to receive phone calls from his musician friends saying that Spencer had reappeared. The were were also reports to this effect in the London Evening Standard newspaper. Brunning contacted the guy and met him in a pub. He says, "I wasn't wholly convinced, but he went a long way towards persuading me that he was Spencer with his astonishingly authentic recollection of the most intimate details of early Fleetwood Mac experiences. He certainly had far more than a passing resemblance to Spencer."

Still "extremely suspicious", Brunning contacted the Evening Standard, whose reporter grilled "Jeremy" for two hours before finally assuring Brunning that this was the right guy. Brunning then organised a gig with his De Luxe Blues band and "Jeremy" in London. They played three songs, and "Jeremy" insisted on playing with his back to the stage. In the audience were Jeremy Spencer's parents, plus their solicitor, who insisted after the show that Brunning go back on to tell the audience that the guitarist was not the real Spencer. Brunning elected to get drunk instead.

The Evening Standard hauled the fake Jeremy into their offices and confronted him with an ex-girlfriend of the real Jeremy's, and she confirmed the hoax. The guy's name was Andrew Clarke, and he'd been impersonating Jeremy for over a decade :eek: jamming with Rory Gallagher at Montreux, and earning a fortune for the Children of God. He claimed that the organisation forced him to do it to capitalise on Jeremy's fame. Brunning found the whole thing very strange... unsurprisingly

Maybe if this guy was forced to do it by the Children of God, it might explain how he knew so many intimate details. Maybe Jeremy was in on it! :laugh:

Besides the size, let's be honest, Jeremy had fairly unique teeth. I wish I could have seen this guy's act.

Brunning doesn't put a date to this story, but the book was written in 1990 so it had to be before that. Green's accountant David Simmons (previously assistant to Clifford Davis I think) told the tale of a guy pretending to be Peter. It was "at a time when Peter was quite reclusive".

One of Simmons' secretaries found him in a pub and she told Simmons, who phoned him. When challenged, the man "became quite offensive and bluffed his way out of the whole thing". He doesn't exactly say that he met the guy, but he does say that he looked a lot like him, with the same kind of beard, and that he even had his picture printed in a magazine of some sort. "He didn't run up any financial credit on the name. I guess he just enjoyed being Peter Green!"

It's about time we had another impostor - who fancies being Danny or Bob Weston or something? :laugh:

Chili can be Dave Walker.

Then again BB has proven that his own recollection of "intimate details" is pretty dodgy. He may not be that hard to fool!

There was a pic posted a while back of a modern guitarist who looked a lot like Danny in the day, and even had the same sense of fashion. He wasn't claiming to be Danny (obviously, as he was way too young), but the resemblance was eerie.

EDIT: I found the thread! http://ledge.fleetwoodmac.net/showthread.php?t=16307

Don't know whether Bob Brunning's fake Peter Green is the same one as Martin Celmins describes in his book - the "Egg & Potato Man". (Anyone from the UK care to comment on this nickname? I've always been curious whether there's a particularly British dish that the name refers to.) That imposter - real name Patrick Harper - is said to have been active around 1992-4. According to Celmins, Harper conned a number of music industry people and was on "the brink of securing a respectable record deal as 'Peter Green'". The edition of Brunning's book that I have has a publication date of 1990 & 1998 - maybe that's a later edition than yours, bretonbanquet? So it's possible that the edition I have could have been updated to discuss the "Egg & Potato Man".

This is from a music paper article here on the Ledge:

"Event took on an even more bizarre twist when in 1992, an Essex farmer, Patrick Harper, nicknamed The Egg & Potato Man, began claiming to be Green on the comeback trail, dumping Queen drummer Roger Taylor amongst others into leading support.

"I saw him one day," Green claims, a touch hazily. "He looked like a Hell's Angel - a bit taller than me, looking kind of strange. I heard a rumour that he went into EMI and to call his bluff they offered him a quarter of a million pound record deal, and he said, No, I better not."

Hi

The Guitar Magazine Vol 5 No 6 (June 1995) has an informative article about the Egg and Potato Man. The word about this "Peter Green" started in 1992.

Patrick Hinfen (Essex farmer, purveyor of eggs and potatoes) started hanging around guitar shops, introducing himself as "Jimi Hendrix" and "Beetroot". After a while people started thinking that it might be Peter Green....

David Edwards, then guitarist with the band National Gold and also manager of KME Guitars (guitar shop in Ilford) was contacted by "Peter Green", who was interested in guitars and guitar sounds. Edwards had met the real Peter in the early 80s, and says that Hinfens hands were very similar to Peter's: "....his hands were unusually large and porcelain-like."

Hinfen and Edwards started to visit the Gibson A&R Centre in London's Denmark Street, and the manager there, Jamie Crompton, says that Hinfen had "the same toothy smile as Peter - the shape of his mouth and teeth were very similar - and he had the big hands as well. It all seemed plausible." Gibson A&R Centre offered "Peter Green" to loan a red dot-neck 335.

Hinfen then wrote the foreword to the Gibson book "'Burst 1958-'60 Les Paul Standard."

Even Neville Martin (ex-Guitarist editor) was also fooled. Hinfen said that he would play with the National Gold on their new album. Jimmy Page, Eric Clapton and Queen's Roger Taylor were also contacted and asked if they wanted to play on the album with "Peter Green", but only Roger Taylor were available. So Taylor donated studio time....

Hinfen's wierd appearance was accepted, as it was well known that the real Peter Green had psychological problems.

The recording sessions went on with Edwards doing most of the solos .. Hinfen did a poor version of "Jigsaw Puzzle Blues"!!! Hinfen also expressed interest in playing at Gibson's "Night Of 100 Guitars" centenary gig which Crompton was co-ordinating), but stressed that he had to be home and in bed by 9!!!

In the end Peter's brother Michael was contacted, and could confirm that Peter hadn't been playing with anybody. (In fact the real Peter was at Michael's home at the moment.)

So later Michael phoned Hinfen asking to speak to Peter. "Speaking", Hinfen replied. "You aren't Peter", said Michael. "I'm his brother". Hinfen told him then that he was just a fan of Peter.............. THE END.

Daniel

Here are two photos from the article......

Yes, it's later than mine - mine's an early edition. This whole thing is just the weirdest affair ever - why do these things always happen to Fleetwood Mac? I'd like to think I'd recognise any member of the band if I saw them, or met someone claiming to be them, but now I'm not so sure :laugh:

So it seems like there must have been another Peter Green imposter, before the Egg & Potato Man, that Bob Brunning talks about in his book.

Makes me think I should grow a beard, move to England.........nahhhh :laugh:

I remember reading the "warning" about the "Egg & Potato Man" on the Splinter Group site back in the early days of the PGSG.

This is certainly an interesting story. But how could Brunning, who supposedly had been so close to the original Mac line-up not know if this was Jeremy or not? If an ex-girlfriend could know, why coouldn't he? This confirms my suspicions that Bob Brunning will do anything to capitalize on his association with the British blues line-up of the Mac. And, like the details in his book, he is frequently wrong.

I'd forgotten the CoG connection. In that case, the poor guy is probably travelling around Sth America still being passed off by the Family as Jeremy.

On the other hand, how do we know that the JS currently recording in Norway is the REAL Jeremy at all?

Well Neb-Maat-Re, the truth is: WE DON'T KNOW!!!:shocked: :shocked: :shocked:

........but we could buy the album... 'cause this dude recording in Norway is a damn good slide guitar player!!!!


Daniel

From 'the horse'
 

This is hilarious. Andrew Clarke was never in the CoG. I don't know him, and I never met him in Latin America posing as me. My parents met him in England at a concert after he had taken off running! The guy was nuts.
Hope this clears it up a little.
Yes, that's me recording in Norway.

one more from the horse
 

and how do you know it's really me posting this message?:

WOW - if that really is you, Jeremy, welcome and hope to see more posts from you! Just ordered the new CD yesterday.

Hi Jeremy.

The "is that the real Jeremy" comment was intended to be light-hearted with no offence meant, so I hope none was taken.

Thanks for clearing up Mr Clarke's claim about the CoG.

Congratulations on the new album.

No offence taken.
 

Thank you! Hope you enjoy the cd at least a tenth as much as I enjoyed making it. Those Norwegians had the right feel. No muss, no fuss, one take and it was done! No redo's! (We had a tight budget!) That's what I like. Ah! The goood old days!!!

Hi Mr Jeremy Spencer, and welcome to the Ledge!

Unfortunately I didn't have the chance to go and see you at Notodden last year, even though I live in Norway. Hope you do more live gigs in Norway. Your new album is absolutely fantastic! And the title track "Precious Little" is in my favourite. Your coice and guitar has been missed... :)

Best wishes,
Daniel

Wow, there's nothing like hearing it from "the horse's mouth" !!! :wavey:

Just goes to show that you can't trust everything you read, and this guy clearly fooled Bob Brunning pretty completely.

Welcome to The Ledge, Jeremy! I hope you come back from time to time to clear up any further mysteries! I'm another one who's ordered the new album and I'm looking forward to it big time :blob2:

How wonderful it would be if more Mac members popped in from time to time to clear up little mysteries like these. :nod: Thank you, Jeremy, hope you are doing well, and congratulations on the release of the new album!

-Lis and Marty

thanks
 

you are welcome. Thank you for the congrats, and to you too, for an excellent and informative site.

Cool! Hi, again, Jeremy! (I say "again", since you responded to one of my questions way back when you did the Q&A here a few years ago).

Ok, mini-Q&A time..now that you're new album is out, do you have any interest in releasing the CoG & Flee albums on CD? (there are pirated versions out there, but the quality is poor due to the transfer from well-worn LPs.) Pristine sounding CDs would be fantastic!

Also, to Marty & Lis, is there something we can do about Jeremy's "Ledgie" status? It just doesn't seem right that a Fleetwood Mac member have only a "Junior Ledgie" status. :thumbsup:

I'll have to tell Marty about that, as I am clueless as to how to change anything.... wouldn't wanna kick him off by accident LOL.

And also a big thanks to Jeremy for being our first brave Q&A guest all those years ago, wow. See what a neat trend he started? :thumbsup:

-Lis

I love this place:)

You know, I have that Gibson "burst" book somewhere and I never believed Peter wrote that intro. That words and phrasing just seem all wrong.

Nice to see Jeremy pop up here, nice to hear you are fit and well. What with John McVie still in "Q&A mode" and the odd visit from Bob Welch it's getting more common for the guys to stop by..

Health and happiness Jeremy. :wavey:

mini answers to q's
 

What questions did u ask me? I don't remember this. Another impostor? Was it on the Ledge? I only just logged onto this site! But I'll answer ur questions.

I would be interested in redoing some choice songs from those albums, I already have ideas. Unfortunately the original 16 track tapes of the COG album got destroyed in a fire, otherwise I would have enjoyed getting in there and being in on a hefty remix.
The Atlantic one I would personally like to let die a natural death so I can have another go at a couple of them that could be more how I would like them.
Hope that answers, Chili!

I just wanted to say that it's great to have you here, Jeremy!

I agree, I don't mean to turn this thread into a JS Q&A but I wasn't here for the actual Q&A so thought I'd try my luck here :)

Hi Jeremy, we've had some discussions here about different stories on who played the piano on "Oh well part 2" (some understood it was you, others Christine, some feel it may have been Peter himself), from the B-side of the single. Do you recall playing on it? I'm working on the new Penguin discography & it'd be a great help to get clarification on this so we know which artists to link specifically to that performance of the song.

Also, when were "Who's knocking" & "Look down at my woman" recorded? They've only shown up on Immediate records compilations & there was speculation that these (along with "Mean old fireman" & "Allow me one more show") were among the tracks from the Levi Set demo you had sent to Mike Vernon. Can you recall if this is accurate or were they in fact recordings you made with FM (i.e. who is on the brushes on LD@MW)?

Thanks in advance. :)

John

P.S. I got my copy of the new album too & think it's great! I recommend it to all here too. :)

another from the horse
 

So glad u likethe album. I enjoy it too, even after many listens.
Okay, your questions! I was wondering when this one would come up, as I was looking at this site's debate over this!
Yes, that's the old 'horse' himself playing piano on Oh Well Pt 2. Peter had to insist I do it because I wasn't sure. He knew I loved the soundtracks to the Ben Hur and King of Kings movies, and that I would (secretly) tinker around with similar melodies on the piano.

'Who's Knocking' and 'Look down at my Woman' on Blues Anytime anthology was recorded with my first band, the Levi Set at Decca Studios in the spring of 67. Ian Charles did the brushes on Woman. We did a couple of other tracks, The Sky is Crying, and I think Travelling Riverside. Long gone probably.

Mean Old Fireman, Allow me one more show, Love that Woman etc. were all recorded after I was with FM, either in CBS or Decca studios.

Ahhh, feels good to clear that up!