In the summer of 1967, Spencer came to the attention of ex-Bluesbreakers guitarist Peter Green, who was looking for another musician to join him in his new Fleetwood Mac project. Spencer was born in Hartlepool, County Durham, and began taking piano lessons at the age of nine. "[4] According to one account by Mick Fleetwood, Spencer apparently had difficulty recovering from a mescaline trip he had experienced very early on the US tour. During the 1980s Spencer lived in the Philippines before working in India in the 1990s, holding charity concerts. This story is from the March 18th, 1971 issue of Rolling Stone. They’ve been on national TV and all over front pages for demonstrations staged by their “Prophets of Doom.” Dressed in red sackcloth (their sign of mourning) and armed with staves and banners bearing doomsday messages, the Prophets – 50 or so at a time – stand in deathly silent vigil at rallies and marches, interrupting the silence with periodic pounding of their staves on the pavement. He did not return, forcing the cancellation of that evening's concert while the band and members of their entourage went searching for him. Keith Richards Drops Video for ‘Hate It When You Leave’ Packed With Everyday Scenes, Tony Lewis, Bassist and Singer for British Pop Rockers the Outfield, Dead at 62, Harry Hudson Discusses Journey With Cancer and How ‘Just Living’ Inspired His New Album, The Wild Stevie Wonder: Rolling Stone’s 1973 Interview, Rodney Dangerfield: He Whines That We May Laugh. [6] Shortly after arriving in LA on February 15,1971, the day of a gig the group was scheduled to perform at the Whisky A Go Go, Spencer left the hotel room he shared with Fleetwood to visit a bookshop on Hollywood Boulevard. And last year, Green flipped himself out of the band, and with Spencer at the lead, Fleetwood went from blues to rock on Kiln House, and from there to an eight-week tour that began February 6th in Vermont. He sits, in tattered rags, among hundreds of so-called “Bible freaks,” in the Children of God “mission” near downtown Los Angeles. He had given his $200 to the mission to distribute among his 400 or so brethren, and he told Davis that he wouldn’t rejoin the band. Jeremy Spencer interviewed by Martin Celmins, Classic Rock magazine, March 2006. That’s fair enough, but there should be a balance.” Mick Fleetwood said Spencer was a changed man, that he didn’t think they’d try to get him back in the band. © Copyright 2020 Rolling Stone, LLC, a subsidiary of Penske Business Media, LLC. Homebrewed Blues (2016) showcased his slide guitar playing while Treading Softly (2018) and Latina Nights (2019) focused on music inspired by Ireland and Latin America respectively. In April 2006, during a question-and-answer session on the Penguin Fleetwood Mac fan website, bassist John McVie said of the reunion idea: In 2007 Spencer was in contact with his former Fleetwood Mac bandmates Mick Fleetwood and John McVie, and according to McVie, the three had informal jam sessions with Rick Vito at Fleetwood's home. For the first time, the defining Elmore James songs were absent on Kiln House; instead, this album featured more of Spencer's 1950s parodies, including the Buddy Holly tribute "Buddy's Song". HOLLYWOOD — Hundreds of people get lost in Los Angeles every day. Since then Spencer has concentrated on instrumental work. [3] He never returned. He dances, chants, sings, prays, eats – and lives – with the Children of God. Another visitor to the building – who’d met Spencer last year – didn’t get the impression that Jeremy had been coerced. Hollywood and Vine is action central for the various God Squads, as they’re called. Green had recruited drummer Mick Fleetwood and temporary bassist Bob Brunning, and wanted a second guitar player to fill out the sound onstage. Being in a fragile mental state and filled with strong negative premonitions, Spencer was very apprehensive about having to travel to LA. They offer tracts and say only “Hello,” waiting for an opening. Since Spencer's musical contributions to the band were too narrowly focused, Green and Fleetwood brought in a third guitarist, 18-year-old Danny Kirwan, after 1968's Mr. During the evening, Spencer became convinced that this change of direction was the best course for him to take, and by the time Fleetwood Mac found him, his mind was made up. The Clash lost Joe Strummer in the early 1980s - but he was found by a private detective in Paris and explained his disappearance saying he had "wanted a break". [7] Despite his continued confidence that he made the right choice, he has said that the manner of his departure from the band was regrettable: "The way I left was wrong and a mistake. “One of the guys there said Jeremy felt he didn’t know why he was so long in doing this. However, the band held together, and both Spencer and Kirwan worked on new songs, which appeared on the Kiln House album released in the late summer of 1970. It proceeded smoothly on to Los Angeles, where the 22-year-old Spencer disappeared. There, Davis found Spencer, his straggly long hair cut short, his clothes exchanged for rags. Send us a tip using our anonymous form. The album showed a return to the blues and the slide guitar style that he became famous for while he was with Fleetwood Mac. His new family was singing “Oh Happy Day.”. He later lived in Ireland and then Germany and still works for the Children of God (now called the Family International), mainly as a book illustrator and story writer. Jeremy Cedric Spencer (born 4 July 1948) is a British musician, best known as one of the guitarists in the original line-up of Fleetwood Mac. Finally, on Thursday, the band’s two road managers were led to the Children of God, at their four-story warehouse home on Towne Street in the downtown industrial sector of Los Angeles. Fleetwood cancelled opening night, and club-owner Elmer Valentine, along with people from Warner Bros., employees at the British Consulate, and, finally, the police, joined the band’s manager, Clifford Davis and two road managers in the search for the guitarist. After a pair of solo albums in the 1970s, he continued to tour as a musician, but did not release another album until 2006. Current membership: There are now 8,000 cult members worldwide, including 400 in this country. Taken at face value, a currently-running Kickstarter campaign for Jeremy Spencer’s upcoming US tour seems rather innocuous and even a bit inspiring. He played the young King Nicolas in The Prince and the Showgirl with Laurence Olivier and Marilyn Monroe and in Ferry to Hong Kong with Orson Welles . He unsuccessfully pleaded with Fleetwood to cancel this leg of the tour. Despite appeals from the band's manager, Clifford Davis, to fulfil his obligations to Fleetwood Mac, Spencer could not be persuaded to rejoin the band and they had to struggle on without him, first recalling Peter Green out of retirement as an emergency measure, and later recruiting new guitarist Bob Welch. Given the news of Spencer’s action, the group called on Peter Green in London to rejoin them for the duration of the tour. Watch Gord Downie's Animated Video for 'River Don't Care', Dolly Parton Made Stephen Colbert Cry With an Old Folk Song on ‘The Late Show’. "[8], Spencer and his then-wife Fiona moved to the US to settle with the Children of God. The group believed Spencer, but they were still stunned. Why Are Men So Compelled to Defend Jacking Off on a Work Zoom? Marvin Gaye: Settled in Ostend, Belgium. “We believe in God, and this is a serious venture,” the quiet fragile Spencer had said then. Switching to guitar in his teens, his speciality became the slide guitar, and he was strongly influenced by the American blues musician Elmore James.[2]. It was intended to complement this album with a separate EP of Spencer's work, but this never materialised.