Blue Cheer was an American rock band that initially performed and recorded in the late 1960s and early 1970s and was sporadically active until 2009.

Peterson had previously been with the Davis-based band the Oxford Circle along with future Blue Cheer members Paul Whaley and Gary Lee Yoder.

The original Blue Cheer personnel were singer/bassist Peterson, guitarist Leigh Stephens and Eric Albronda as drummer.

Albronda was later replaced by Whaley, who was joined by Peterson's brother Jerre (guitar), Vale Hamanaka (keyboards), and Jere Whiting (vocals, harmonica).

It has been said that Blue Cheer decided to adopt a power trio configuration after seeing Jimi Hendrix perform at the Monterey Pop Festival.

Their first hit was a cover version of Eddie Cochran's "Summertime Blues" from their debut album Vincebus Eruptum (1968).

Peterson also contributed to the album the eight-minute "Doctor Please" and "Second Time Around", which features Paul Whaley's frantic drum solo.

[17] The group underwent several personnel changes, the first occurring after the 1968 release of Outsideinside after Leigh Stephens – who never used drugs – was asked to leave the band after criticizing his bandmates' behaviour.

[19] Blue Cheer's style now changed to a more commercial hard rock sound à la Steppenwolf or Iron Butterfly.

[22] By May of that year, they had switched the name back to "Blue Cheer" and the Petersons were co-writing new songs and slowly attracting more bookings.

In 1984, Peterson had better luck when he returned with Whaley and Rainier as Blue Cheer and a brand new album The Beast Is Back, which was released on the New York label Megaforce Records.

That same year, Dickie led yet another new lineup of the Cheer that had Ruben De Fuentes back on guitar and Eric Davis on drums.

In 1988, the line-up changed once again, being now composed of Dickie Peterson (bass), with Andrew "Duck" MacDonald (guitar) and Dave Salce (drums).

During this time, they played with classic rock acts as well as then-up-and-coming bands: Mountain, Outlaws, Thunder, The Groundhogs, Ten Years After, Mucky Pup, Biohazard and others.

In 1992, Peterson recorded his first solo album, Child of the Darkness, in Cologne with a band named "The Scrap Yard".

Peterson and Leigh Stephens were together once again in Blue Cheer with drummer Prairie Prince at the Chet Helms Memorial Tribal Stomp in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park on October 29, 2005, and their lively performance drew old rockers like Paul Kantner and others from backstage to observe.

They did some recordings in Virginia in Winter 2005 with Joe Hasselvander of Raven and Pentagram on drums, due to Paul Whaley choosing to remain in Germany.

[42] The matter had upset Dickie Peterson, given his position as a co-founder of the band and the only continuing member since its inception, but does not appear to have been resolved.

[9] According to Tim Hills in his book, The Many Lives of the Crystal Ballroom,[47] "Blue Cheer was the epitome of San Francisco psychedelia."

Jim Morrison of The Doors characterized the group as "the single most powerful band I've ever seen"[48] and Eric Clapton defined them as "probably the originators of heavy metal".

[51][52][53][54][55] Billy Altman reported that at a 1968 concert the band was "So loud, in fact, that within just a few songs, much of the crowd in the front orchestra section was fleeing.