''Split'' is a 1971

blues rock Blues rock is a fusion music genre that combines elements of blues and rock music. It is mostly an electric ensemble-style music with instrumentation similar to electric blues and rock (electric guitar, electric bass guitar, and drums, sometimes w ...

studio

album An album is a collection of audio recordings issued on compact disc (CD), Phonograph record, vinyl, audio tape, or another medium such as Digital distribution#Music, digital distribution. Albums of recorded sound were developed in the early ...

recorded by UK blues-rock group

Groundhogs The groundhog (''Marmota monax''), also known as a woodchuck, is a rodent of the family Sciuridae, belonging to the group of large ground squirrels known as marmots. The groundhog is a lowland creature of North America; it is found through mu ...

, originally released by

Liberty Records Liberty Records was a record label founded in the United States by chairman Simon Waronker in 1955 with Al Bennett as president and Theodore Keep as chief engineer. It was reactivated in 2001 in the United Kingdom and had two previous revival ...

in 1971 with catalogue number LBG 83401. It was reissued on CD reissue in 2003 by Liberty / EMI Records, with catalogue number 07243-584819-2-1. In September 2020 it was released on limited-edition red vinyl (as well as CD) from

Fire Records Fire Records was an American independent record label, set up in 1959 by Bobby Robinson. Amongst others, it released records by Lightnin' Hopkins, Elmore James, Buster Brown and Arthur Crudup. At one point it was thought Fire had issued the la ...

, including a second disc containing a number of outtakes and new sleeve notes by Dave Henderson of

Mojo Magazine ''Mojo'' is a popular music magazine published monthly in the United Kingdom, initially by Emap, and since January 2008 by Bauer. Following the success of the magazine '' Q'', publishers Emap were looking for a title that would cater for the bur ...

. According to Tony McPhee's sleeve notes for the 2003 CD reissue, the lyrics for ''Split'' were inspired by a

panic attack Panic attacks are sudden periods of intense fear and discomfort that may include palpitations, sweating, chest pain or chest discomfort, shortness of breath, trembling, dizziness, numbness, confusion, or a feeling of impending doom or of losing ...

he experienced in May 1970, and the studio version of "Cherry Red" was recorded live in a single take.

Track listing

All tracks composed by Tony McPhee # "Split - Part One" - 4:25 # "Split - Part Two" - 5:10 # "Split - Part Three" - 4:25 # "Split - Part Four" - 5:38 # "Cherry Red" - 5:40 # "A Year in the Life" - 3:07 # "Junkman" - 4:52 # "Groundhog" - 5:35 "Groundhog" is based on "Ground Hog Blues" by

John Lee Hooker John Lee Hooker (August 22, 1912 or 1917 – June 21, 2001) was an American blues singer, songwriter, and guitarist. The son of a sharecropper, he rose to prominence performing an electric guitar-style adaptation of Delta blues. Hooker often ...

Bonus tracks on 2003 CD reissue

(recorded live in 1972 for a BBC ''In Concert'' programme) # "Split - Part One" - 9:42 # "Split - Part Two" - 6:13 # "Split - Part Four" - 4:27 # "Cherry Red" - 4:06

Bonus tracks on 2020 red vinyl reissue

(Fire Records, FIRELP508) # "Split - Part One (instrumental)" - 5:14 # "Split - Part Two (take three)" - 5:18 # "Split - Part Three (unlisted take with overdubbed guitar)" - 6:52 # "Cherry Red (take six)" - 6:07 # "A Year in the Life (instrumental)" - 3:13 # "Split - Part Three (no intro)" - 4:02 # "Split - Part Four (instrumental)" - 6:54

Personnel

;Groundhogs *

Tony McPhee Anthony Charles McPhee (born 23 March 1944) is an English guitarist, and founder of the blues rock band Groundhogs. An early version of this band backed Champion Jack Dupree and John Lee Hooker on UK concerts in the mid-1960s. He is often credit ...

– guitars, vocals *Peter Cruikshank – bass guitar *Ken Pustelnik – drums ;Technical *

Martin Birch Martin Birch (27 December 19489 August 2020) was a British music producer and sound engineer. He became renowned for engineering and producing albums recorded predominantly by British rock bands, including Deep Purple, Rainbow, Fleetwood Mac, W ...

- engineer *Chris Richardson - sleeve design, photography

''Split Up - An Exhumation by Andrew Liles''

In 2015,

Andrew Liles Andrew Liles (born 11 March 1969) is a British sound artist and multi-instrumentalist. He has a vast output of recordings that he has released since the mid-1980s, covering a variety of styles as experimental music, dark ambient music, progr ...

and Tony McPhee remixed the album, in a "reconstruction, reordering and rearrangement", using modern effects. McPhee said Liles had "done what I would have if I'd had the modern pedals. Andrew has done me a great service by bringing my recordings into the 21st Century."

References

{{Authority control 1971 albums The Groundhogs albums Liberty Records albums United Artists Records albums Fire Records (UK) albums