About The Groundhogs
The Groundhogs were an English blues and rock band founded in late 1963 in London. Named after John Lee Hooker's song "Ground Hog Blues", they were part of the burgeoning British rhythm and blues scene, backing Hooker on his album ...And Seven Nights. They were predominantly a power trio of Tony McPhee , Peter Cruickshank and Ken Pustelnik , with Clive Brooks replacing Pustelnik in 1972 until the band split in 1974. They issued seven albums via Liberty/UA, including the UK Top 10 Thank Christ for the Bomb , Split and Who Will Save the World? .
McPhee resurrected the name with a different rhythm section in 1975 for two more studio albums, and again in 1982 to 2003 for a further two studio albums. A re-union of the early 1970s trio in 2003 ended Mcphee's run, with Cruickshank and Pustelnik continuing as The Groundhogs Rhythm Section. McPhee resurrected the name again in 2007 through to 2014, although only for live performances.
The band were originally formed as the Dollar Bills in New Cross, London, in 1962 by brothers John and Peter Cruickshank in Calcutta, West Bengal, India). Tony McPhee , the lead guitarist in the instrumental group the Seneschals, joined the group later that year. McPhee steered them towards the blues and renamed them after the John Lee Hooker song "Ground Hog Blues".
At John Cruickshank's suggestion, they became John Lee's Groundhogs when they backed Hooker on his 1964 UK tour. They later supplemented Little Walter, Jimmy Reed and Champion Jack Dupree when they toured the UK. McPhee featured on Dupree's From New Orleans to Chicago alongside Eric Clapton. Groundhogs issued "Shake It" backed with "Rock Me" on the Interphon record label in January 1965.
The line-up on their first album, Scratchin' the Surface, produced by the 19-year-old head of A&R for Liberty Records, Mike Batt, and released in November 1968, consisted of McPhee as singer and guitarist, bassist Peter Cruickshank, Ken Pustelnik on drums and Steve Rye on harmonica.
Rye left the band leaving them as a power trio to record Blues Obituary , titled after McPhee "realised that the audience for 12-bar blues was dwindling". A single from the album "B.D.D." , flopped in the UK but peaked at number one in Lebanon.
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