Fleetwood Mac - Between Blues and Enchantment

The name Fleetwood Mac is often seen as the embodiment of a rock schizophrenia. First, oblique masters of a visceral blues-rock nonetheless constantly straining toward mystical transfiguration, then standard-bearers of a new melodic sensibility, crystalline, enchanted, entranced and enthusiastic, also marked by an ineffable worldwide fame.

These two incarnations, which a broad-brush view might simply call rock for the first part and pop for the second, inevitably carry with them the stamp of their guiding personalities: for the first phase, Peter “Green” Greenbaum, for the second, the duo Stevie Nicks/Lindsey Buckingham.

Peter Green is one of the first guitarists for whom the format (the song), the genre (blues-rock) and the medium (the record, whether long-playing or 45 rpm single) feel too confining, or are nothing more than a pretext for trying to express the inexpressible, a supernatural torment that is no longer (or not only) a classic lament on the human condition, but above all an existential grief over an inner void, and its possible spiritual healing.

Stevie Nicks (vocals) and Lindsay Buckingham (guitar), on the other hand, are two consummate scene-stealers who knew how to wait for the right moment to rise, without seeking stylistic upheaval or commercial success, fine-tuning the pop idiom in every one of its aspects (and perhaps precisely for that reason achieving enormous fame with Rumours, one of the best-selling albums of all time).

Restlessness vs. re-alignment is, then, one possible dichotomy, but it can also be seen as a continuum. And it's a continuum that leads from the dirty blues lands of Britain to the rebirth of American pop, just as power-pop seems to start losing consciousness (and a minute before the singer-songwriter explosion of Springsteen and Petty). Nonetheless, both Then Play On for Green and Tusk for Buckingham stand as significant gifts to rock in its totality.

Peter Green – born in a London district in 1946 – upon launching the Fleetwood Mac name, was already well aware of his role: to pick up the thread that had broken off with the death and/or obscurity of the great restless bluesmen (Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf, Slim Harpo etc.), while adding to it a strong sense of transcendental humanity. In a sense, he redefined the role of electric guitar in blues-rock, having it take its first steps as an alter-ego of the voice, in parallel with the explorations of Keith Richards and Eric Clapton.

After playing, alongside the ever-faithful drummer Mick Fleetwood, first in Peter B's Looners and then in Shotgun Express (with a very young Rod Stewart on vocals), Green joined John Mayall's Bluesbreakers to replace an Eric Clapton increasingly drawn towards the Cream project, and thus recorded the seminal "Hard Road" (at the close of 1966). Green even became something of a lieutenant to the bandleader, suggesting that his pal Mick Fleetwood replace the Bluesbreakers' original drummer, alongside bassist John McVie.

At this point the future leader took Fleetwood and McVie aside to secretly record a demo. Only at the end of this (London) session did the idea of forming a band with these members finally take shape: Peter Green on guitar and vocals, Jeremy Spencer on slide, John McVie on bass (initially alongside Bob Brunning) and Mick Fleetwood on drums.

The debut single, released in October 1967, was accordingly a furious cover of Robert Johnson's "I Believe My Time Ain't Long", with which Green paid a superstitious tribute to one of the great founding fathers of the whole genre. The band then recorded "Shake Your Moneymaker", a Billy Haley-style skiffle turned into a breakneck sprint, and above all "Black Magic Woman", a pounding calypso charged with the syncopations of the rhythm section, the shamanic accents of the guitar and the drive of the final jam — their first masterpiece.

Meanwhile, the plan took shape to stretch the blues-rock insights of these early singles into a full-length format. The debut album, Peter Green's Fleetwood Mac (renamed as such to distinguish it from the 1975 album of the same name, dominated instead by the Buckingham-Nicks pairing), released in 1968, is however overall inferior in quality to the 45s, even if buoyed by the verve of tracks like "My Heart Beat Like A Hammer", "Looking For Somebody", "No Place To Go" (by Howlin' Wolf) and the masterful acoustic blues of "The World Keep On Turning".

The singles nonetheless remained the ideal habitat for best expressing Peter Green's visionary streak. The 1968-70 period saw a spectacular crescendo of lysergic imagination. First came "Need Your Love So Bad", a Billboard-style slow number with hazy strings, reverent guitar and Ray Charles-style crooning, followed by the instrumental "Albatross", a tropical-Caribbean galop in slow motion, the contrite ballad "Man Of The World" (in the wake of "Albatross"), the double A-side "Oh Well", moving from a tribal, almost pre-heavy-metal jam to a suspended, restless, unstable folk excursus (and a remarkable forerunner of Led Zeppelin's "Stairway To Heaven"), and "Rattlesnake Shake", driven by handclaps and turbulent guitar fumes, closing with the imposing "Green Manalishi", the absolute nadir of his early period. Just as noteworthy are the b-sides: the bare, almost prehistoric "Ramblin' Pony", carried only by percussion and pulsing harmonica, "Jigsaw Puzzle Blues", and the tough cocktail-lounge groove of "Something Inside Of Me".

Mr Wonderful (1968), the second official album, tries instead to escape the sense of fragmentation of its predecessor. It succeeds with "Stop Messin' Round" (Tamla-Motown horns, sharp guitar, good-natured boogie), "Rollin' Man" (r'n'b for piano and horns that then erupts into a fresh shuffle), "Love That Burns" (a drowsy, almost static soul serenade) and the desolate adagio of "Trying So Hard To Forget", torn between harmonica breaths and muted instruments. But it's also the album in which Green's guitar increasingly takes centre stage, as proven by the instrumental "Evenin' Boogie", where the decisive protagonists are spasms worthy of Chuck Berry.

Both the first Fleetwood Mac album and Mr Wonderful lack the brashness of the other great British bands grappling with blues-rock (Rolling Stones, Them, Animals), but they are equally endowed with an infectious freshness and a reflective quality — highlighted far more by the chromatic shadings of Green's guitar than by the singing — that sounded decidedly unprecedented for a rock'n'roll band still only half weaned. As shown by the almost Gershwin-esque harmonic progression (in the vein of "Summertime") of "Love That Burns", their music seems to come from remote eras and blur into the fabric of Western popular music.

Mr Wonderful remains, of the two, the more coherent collection; besides softening the sound with soul horns and fully fleshed-out arrangements (also with keyboard infiltrations from a very young Christine Perfect, on loan from Chicken Shack), it also carries with it a planning care that would prove decisive, both in partly setting aside cover tributes and in blending disparate stylistic elements.

In a manner similar to the Rolling Stones' earliest compilation albums, English Rose (1968) and Pious Bird of Good Omen (1969) speculate rather poorly on singles, b-sides and session leftovers, even though they serve as a closing chapter to the singles era. The fullest compendium of this period can be found in the double album Vaudeville Years (1998).

America came right after; drawn to the land of the great bluesmen, the five of them made their way to Chicago, where they even recorded some sessions with Otis Spann and Willie Dixon (later immortalised on the double album Fleetwood Mac in Chicago/Blues Jam In Chicago), and took part in extraordinary festivals (alongside Chuck Berry, B.B. King and Led Zeppelin).

The band was now ready to take the plunge and record its magnum opus; although the line-up continued to show signs of instability, the moment was ripe to raise their ambitions. In came Danny Kirwan (officially), on second vocals and second guitar, and Christine Perfect (once again unofficially) on keyboards, on loan from Chicken Shack, having already made an imperceptible appearance back in the days of Mr Wonderful.

The band thus assembled recorded Then Play On (released in late '69), a prophetic record that would be Peter Green's swansong with Fleetwood Mac, and a collection of voracious jam-rock avant-garde that would leave a void in its wake.

Still leaning on a few extracts drawn from singles — which it nonetheless blends perfectly into the album's overall metaphysical mood — the record is above all an excursus on the very meaning of the blues, now felt far more as a grandiose, hieratic mindset than as a broad stylistic end in itself. Accordingly, "Rattlesnake Shake", a harsh, distorted catharsis set to a Chicago blues tempo, and "Oh Well", a lopsided, unbalanced psychosis in the form of an electric-acoustic psalm, are both splendid forerunners.

The two parts of "Madge" are the album's other pillar (and of Green's career with Fleetwood Mac). It kicks off like an unleashed improvisation; suddenly it breaks off to make way for a few seconds of boogie-woogie. Then it starts up again, even more possessed than before, modulating in a jazz-like manner until it takes on transcendental qualities. The texture suddenly unravels into complete rarefaction; in the silence, the guitar converses first with the bass and then even with an entire orchestra, utterly absorbed in a true sonic fresco. In the second part the opening jam starts up again (though the impression is that the track could begin anew ad libitum), leaving the field wide open to the tireless ramblings of Green's guitar.

Yet beneath its soothing surface, every track conceals deeply anomalous elements. "When You Say", somewhere between chamber serenade and formulaic madrigal with a Renaissance-Monteverdian bent, anticipates and even catalyzes the learned madness of Syd Barrett and Robert Wyatt. "Although The Sun Is Shining" is another Barrett-esque lullaby "mixed" with a sort of vintage crooning, over Spanish-flavored guitars. Even the conventional blues-rock song form of "Like Crying" struggles to twist its own features into something new: a vividly enthusiastic mood (bordering on parody), the absence of drums, ringing guitar phrasing.

So in "Underway", a mournful instrumental lament where the guitar stands placidly alone while the backing band raises the harmonic stakes, in "My Dream" the phrasing aims for pure existential eloquence, and in "Showbiz Blues" (practically a continuation of the skeletal stomp of "Ramblin' Pony") a slide-oriented r'n'b soul turns into a naif saraband, almost pre-Tim Buckley.

And Green, still not satisfied, manages to gut even the biggest showpieces ("Closing My Eyes", "Coming Your Way") through carefully measured instrumental touches, like djambé drums standing in for the drum kit, discreet bluesy keyboard tones (in place of the typical guitar strumming), aching soul vocals (in place of shouter-style belting), with the guitar acting as a suffering counterpoint (in place of the usual long-winded solos).

The work that kicks off the album-oriented era, and with which pupil Green far surpasses master Mayall, Then Play On is the point of no return for blues-oriented rock songwriting, utterly indifferent to stylistic prescriptions, poses and appearances, instead transfigured into a parallel galaxy.

Ironically, this album also closes out the Green era of Fleetwood Mac, misunderstood even by his own bandmates. The former leader is thus ready to release End of The Game (1970), his first solo album, in which he explores the hostile cosmos of free jamming in abstract, entirely instrumental form — one of the most important rock albums of all time.

Following this masterpiece, after a series of legendary wanderings (partly for work, partly due to health problems), came a string of recordings that would fail to live up to his genius: In The Skies (1979), not unworthy (featuring the title track's continuation of "Black Magic Woman", the luminous solos of "A Fool No More" — the only faint echo of Game — and the flamenco tones of "Apostle", reminiscent of Play On), the even more mature Little Dreamer (1980), Watcha Gonna Do? (1981), with its monotonous electronic production, and the dreadful White Skies (1982) and Kolors (1983).

Under the name Peter Green's Katmandu he records A Case for The Blues two years later, while with the Splinter Group he devotes himself entirely to blues classics (starting with Peter Green Splinter Group, from 1997).

Although he made a comeback, Peter Green remained consigned to obscurity, even as he kept paying passionate (if not especially artistic) tribute to black music. His prestige runs in inverse proportion to the quality of his work; the only one to pay him any real tribute is Carlos Santana, who in the same year as End Of The Game sent a soothing tropicalia version of "Black Magic Woman" up the radio airwaves and the sales charts.

Jeremy Spencer too would sink into an inglorious solo career with releases like Jeremy Spencer, Jeremy Spencer And The Children and Flee, right up to the recent Precious Little (2006).

Fleetwood Mac, meanwhile, were about to enter a none-too-happy transitional phase. Now dominated by two new guitarists, Jeremy Spencer (also on vocals) and Danny Kirwan, who came from Tramp, and backed by an increasingly assured Christine Perfect (who had in the meantime married bassist John McVie), the band decided to close the book on the Green era, left reeling by such a radical approach to rock music, and to reset its course.

Kiln House (1970), the first album of this new phase, accordingly pivots on a lighter, more graceful sound, edging toward revivalism. The nostalgic streak nonetheless remains prominent and takes shape in some genuinely fine numbers, full of soft, compromise-laden arrangements. Future Games, from the following year, sums up the elements of this transitional period even better than Kiln House does. The line-up settles around Bob Welch (the new leader) and the ever-present Mick Fleetwood on drums, with Danny Kirwan (Welch's second-in-command, the Peter Green figure of this era) and the McVie couple (John, and Christine, now the official keyboardist as well as backing vocalist) rounding things out. An early sign of AOR ("Sands Of Time", "Woman of 1000 Years", "Lay It All Down") that would later be refined into melodic ease, Future Games draws on a marked balance between songwriting, arrangement and band feeling; what it lacks is real production — and, as a result, a fair bit of extra credibility.

Bare Trees (1972) is the last album to feature Danny Kirwan in the line-up. The sound grows even sturdier, becoming both tighter and more assured, but at the same time more commercial, more pub-rock, even as it shows some real songwriting grit from Christine (crucial for the future). Kirwan proves himself Green's true heir above all on "Dust", an easygoing vocal performance — with a cappella voices — cheerfully backed by his faithful guitar. Even the title track stands out for its obsessive folk-rock (later transfigured into a thunderous finale). Among Welch's compositions, the best is "Sentimental Lady", a prayer of voices and languid guitar.

Without Kirwan (replaced by Bob Weston), Welch is practically lost, and Penguin (1973) proves it beyond doubt. Essentially a continuation of Bare Trees, Penguin nonetheless leans on greater technical command (Christine's singing above all), and especially on a sound and production more polished than before. The same year the same line-up released Mystery To Me, with even more sophisticated production and an (if anything) even softer sound.

Heroes Are Hard To Find (1974) abandons any pretense of depth. Production itself takes over completely: the title track is jovial disco soul-pop, "Angel" is over-arranged lounge music, and the usual Christine McVie pairing ("Come A Little Bit Closer" and "Prove Your Love") this time plunges headlong into easy listening with a profusion of string arrangements (with Christine the singer left playing the role of little mermaid).

In 1974 Kirwan took on various collaborations, going on to record Tramp's second album, "Put A Record On" (before continuing his solo career with Second Chapter and Midnight In San Juan), and in '77 Bob Welch made his debut with a dose of glam on French Kiss (which would be followed by Three Hearts, The Other One and Man Overboard).

Fleetwood Mac, instead, need a strong driving force who – beyond literally keeping them alive – can bring real competence to their listless wandering through the pastures of melodic rock. The band thus arrives at a pivotal moment: the band's immovable engine, Mick Fleetwood, listens to a song from the album credited to Buckingham Nicks (1973), and is struck by it. He is then introduced to a no-longer-so-young Lindsey Buckingham (the enfant prodige of Palo Alto, born 1949), a detached guitarist-songwriter who at first seems ill-suited to shoulder the burden of reviving the noble rock tradition of such a storied group.

But in Buckingham Nicks, Fleetwood clearly glimpses the primordial version of the ballads that will later triumph on the band's mature albums, and so he does not hesitate to overhaul the line-up: with Buckingham recruited as guitarist, singer and principal songwriter, and the McVies confirmed in their roles, the line-up also takes on Buckingham's girlfriend, singer Stevie Nicks, as a kind of new emblem for the group. Originally overlooked by Fleetwood (who certainly wasn't thinking of a "frontwoman"), Stevie Nicks joins the group because Buckingham strongly insisted on it, as a condition for taking on his new role.

Far from being a fifth wheel in the middle of two couples, Mick Fleetwood actually brings a sound logic to the band: on one side, the "melodic-atmospheric section" (Nicks-Buckingham), on the other, the supporting framework (the two McVies, providing backing vocals, countermelody, as well as keyboard flourishes and resolute bass).

The metamorphosis is now essentially complete. Purged of the introverted damnation of blues from the Peter Green era, the band gradually becomes a concentrate of singable songs built from the most disparate materials. This is not a mere commercial shift; everything, from the atmosphere of crystalline enchantment and vital transfiguration, to the polished production, even the album covers, evokes an idea of seductive bliss, almost suspended in a crystallized space-time.

To achieve this, Lindsey Buckingham carries out an ingenious transformation: he takes pop music from every era (from vocal groups, to beat music, to the Beach Boys, all the way to the – future – Cars of Ocasek), extracts its essential components (vocal harmonies and quick-grab cadence) and transplants them into the contemporary era – the era, from '75 to the end of the decade, shaped by new wave (punk, goth, EBM, etc.), by technological and industrial rock, but also by the new roots-rock and the new generation of singer-songwriters.

The revolution is so sly (and so quiet) and the mechanism so well oiled, that almost no one seems to notice it at all.

Buckingham and Fleetwood act as if nothing happened: Fleetwood Mac are virtually making their debut, as if Green had never existed.

Fleetwood Mac (1975) would like to stand tall as an effective transmission belt between the two eras, but in truth it cuts all ties with the past. Its songs have nothing to do with the Kirwan-Welch transitional period (aside from a few scraps on the second side), let alone the Green era.

"Rhiannon" is the new era's statement of intent, a sinuous melody through which newcomer Stevie Nicks asserts herself, starting as a half-whispered murmur before rising to an imperious full voice, amid solemn chords and choruses, boastful tones and pragmatic intent. Almost a feminist j'accuse, "Rhiannon" essentially overturns Peter Green's premises; even if the structural approach is similar, the blend of inquisition and enchantment transposes the song into an entirely different perspective, built on contagious melody and veiled metaphysics.

Equally emblematic are "Warm Ways", a mellifluous serenade of guitar and keyboard with beat-group harmonies, turned into an impalpable lament, and "Monday Morning", a resolute nursery-rhyme built on West Coast chords and country harmonies, which expands choraly, with a drum part that has never been so purely accompanying (and no longer percussive in any real sense). Then there's "Blue Letter", a vibrant southern-tinged tune (the most demonstrative of this period's new vitality compared to the preceding records), which unfurls the backbone of a two-part chorus, a firm hand in the songwriting, and even the compactness of a Buckingham solo in the style of J.J. Cale.

"Landslide", on the other hand, is the album's artistic peak. Starting from a melancholic acoustic piece, Nicks' voice claims the spotlight with a Joan Baez-like magnetism (even surpassing her in vocal prowess), while the arpeggiated chord progression grows richer bar by bar. The same delicacy of arrangement also elevates relatively minor tracks like "Sugar Daddy", a jovial ballad for piano and gospel organ, or the transfigured, CSN&Y-style neurosis of "Over My Head" (both written by Christine McVie).

Rounding out the picture are "Say You Love Me" (a pop variation on the Mitchell-esque "Court And Spark" canon, redeemed from flatness by the jingle-jangle of the guitars and its accompanying solo), and the disguised "World Turning".

A record of formal perfection – especially in the spectacular arrangement of the closing slow number, Buckingham's "I'm So Afraid" – the album still owes a debt to certain strains of AOR and US mainstream radio. Even if its content is still somewhat imprecise, the allure of its melodic constructions is undeniable.

The ultimate (but perhaps most significant) message of this album is that it brings the new leadership of the couple to a point of pure artistic imposition, the final and greatest force responsible for the sacrilegious denial of the blues roots of the original project.

Crowning both the couple and the reborn band is, in any case, Rumours (1977), one of the best-selling albums of all time (and a worldwide success almost embarrassing in scale, given the circumstances), proof that the recipe devised by Buckingham, infallible here, finally received the credibility it deserved.

First of all, the melodic dimension reaches an almost flawless level; secondly, the individual elements of the songwriting balance each other with extreme care; finally, the production becomes dazzling, able to enhance every timbre, making them volumetric, almost spatialized.

Like other top-tier acts, from Steely Dan to Chicago, Fleetwood Mac manage to bring together every nuance, in radiant gems like "Go Your Own Way", "Don't Stop", "You Make Lovin' Fun" and the proud "The Chain". Nicks's volatile personality overflows in "Dreams", the album's lead single, while Christine McVie — by now a fully-fledged singer — reaches her first true peak in "Songbird".

This overcoming of the Spector-ian standard is one of Lindsey Buckingham's greatest achievements, one whose legacy would include dozens of light-pop songwriters (from Shania Twain to Faith Hill), but also restless ones like Kristin Hersh and Courtney Love.

Not content with that, and almost indifferent to the huge sales of that album, Buckingham and Fleetwood Mac, with the double album Tusk (1979), go so far as to retract the approach of the two previous records. On Tusk the arrangements are no longer merely fluid, but downright creative, even erudite, ever further from blues memories and ever closer to the contemporary US wave scene (Feelies, Talking Heads, Cars).

"Tusk", the title track, is the equivalent of Rumours's production pushed to its most extreme consequences, as if Nick Mason or Robert Wyatt had stepped into the studio during the sessions — an oblique pagan dance (of Cuban ancestry) topped by hysterical vocalizations, roaring noise and absolute walls of sound, something of a "Interstellar Overdrive" for the occasion. And "The Ledge", a Bolivian-tinged melody driven by a dotted rhythm, pairs well with "I Know I'm Not Wrong", where it dissolves into choruses, horns and percussive tricks.

Aside from these individual compositions penned by his own hand, Buckingham finally manages to step into the role of artistic director. In its own way, Tusk is a difficult record, or at least an intelligent one, because it leans on the characterization of the band's members, feigning splits among them and turning them into so many artistic impulses. "Walk A Thin Line" is one of his most soothing, almost hypnotic melodies (sung in a falsetto backed by near-Gregorian choruses); the same goes for the Caribbean-flavored "That's All For Everyone", in the form of a reverberated psalm. "What Makes You Think You're The One" shows off a martial Buckingham, with velvety epic psych guitar and eccentric drumming launched at a jittery pace, while "That's Enough For Me" is almost cow-punk (the album's biggest concession to the charts, even more than the melodic yet muscular psychedelia of "Not That Funny").

Further proof of an even greater focus on atmosphere rather than song construction — almost as if this were their own Exile On Main Street (from which they even borrow certain moves, as in "Think About Me") — comes from the enchantment of "Over & Over", and the retro-barbershop vocal harmonies of "Save Me A Place" (almost an expansion of "Never Going Back Again" from Rumours).

For her part, Stevie Nicks gets the chance to delve deeper into the emotionality of "Dreams" in the guitar strums of "Sisters Of The Moon" and in "Sara". "Storms", on the other hand, is a roots lullaby built on quivering guitar, which gradually turns it into an anguished song; along similar lines, "Beautiful Child" sounds like a kind of melodic-sentimental homily that slowly rises.

McVie contributes in varied but almost always significant ways: there's the measured, slightly folk-tinged pop song "Never Forget", there's the rhodes-and-percussion-driven ditty of "Honey Hi", there's the pensive, rarefied ballad "Brown Eyes". And above all, there's "Never Make Me Cry", an even more stretched-out, exultant and solitary "Think About Me", with Christine's voice (and its echo) amid keyboard reflections and barely sketched chords that simply mark time.

This meticulous work on atmosphere ultimately serves to fully explore a sound that, in truth, was perhaps being wasted. Tusk is thus a stylistic adventure built on continuity, but a heterogeneous continuity split among all the band's personalities, fully in line with the great double albums of rock music (from the aforementioned "Exile" to "Third" by Soft Machine, to "Ummagumma" etc).

It's no coincidence that Tusk also kicks off the era of solo projects for the classic line-up.

Stevie Nicks will improvise herself into the role of a hushed songwriter, albeit with too much faith in her charisma as a mainstream starlet. Bella Donna is nonetheless elevated by a certain expressionism in the arrangements, and above all by the country music-box sound of "Leather and Lace", by some solemn continuations of "Dreams" (such as "Bella Donna" and "Stop Draggin' My Heart Around", backed by Tom Petty with Heartbreakers in tow) and by the pathos-laden — almost AOR — "Kind Of Woman". The instrumental sections, suitably expanded, act almost as emotional conduits that heighten the agitation of her theatrical turmoil. Then Nicks falters on "After The Glitter Fades" and "Think About It" and in the self-parody of "Outside The Rain", and in general gets carried away by typical building progressions, even if "How Still My Love" keeps a crystalline fervor. "Edge of Seventeen", perhaps the most genuine track, sits halfway between a soft Moroder and a frantic ABBA.

The following The Wild Heart, while still keeping an eye on listenability, raises the stakes (vocally, above all) of her artistic persona, in pleas as vitalistic as they are decadent and in gospel melodies tackled head-on à la Kim Carnes ("The Wild Heart"). Her vocabulary has grown overall, both in the uptempo numbers ("Enchanted") and in the synth-based midtempos ("If Anyone Falls"), in the melancholic — yet still dynamic — ballad ("Gate and Garden"), and above all in the atmospheric disco of "Stand Back" (essentially a sonic illusion of production), the flip side of Madonna's dancefloor sound. Too much becomes too much in the overblown orchestral slow number "Beauty and the Beast", but the electronic arrangements of "Nothing Ever Changes" and "I Will Run to You" are sufficiently personalized. Aside from "Nightbird" and "Sable on Blonde", this is an almost auteur-like Nicks trying to leave behind the Fleetwood Mac stereotypes of her partner Buckingham, or at least to turn them to her own personal credit.

On Rock A Little, released two years later, the sophistication is pushed to the point of spilling shamelessly into hit-parade sounds. The singer's voice, even more powerful, less afraid to show rhythmic nuance and vocal imperfection, finds itself up against a polished techno-rock ("Sister Honey", too demanding to be a real hit, and "I Can't Wait") in which even the backing vocals, once choral, have flattened into postcard-like decoration. There's more playfulness that makes the sound even more accommodating, as on "Imperial Hotel", yet it's never able to gather strength into memorable refrains ("Some Become Strangers"), and instead only lets Nicks dabble as an amateur Tina Turner ("Talk To Me"). Instead, "I Sing For The Things" and the other ballads are the only things that really work.

For her fourth album, The Other Side Of The Mirror, Nicks takes her time (at least four years in the making). What results is the best possible continuation of Rock A Little, giving substance to its approach with production that finally hits home ("Long Way To Go") and richer colors in the songwriting, both in "Ooh My Love", almost a choral anthem, and in the brazen Joe Cocker-style R&B of "Whole Lotta Trouble", right up to becoming vibrant again on "Ghosts". Also surprising is her update to the Rickenbacker-and-pub-rock revival of the E Street Band, nowhere more so than on "Alice" and "Fire Burning". It's perhaps her most personal album, or her most level-headed one. The limits of the songwriting remain, which her collaborators (including Bruce Hornsby) fail to soothe, and which perhaps only Nicks herself manages to mask with her ever more self-absorbed voice.

The dreadful Street Angel unfortunately brings back to the fore the two main problems with Nicks as a solo artist: the self-parody of “Dreams” and the image of a melodic dance-pop prom queen (hopelessly out of step with the times). Trouble In Shangri-La, thanks to a star-studded cast (from Sheryl Crow to Macy Gray to Sarah McLachlan), gives new motion to her otherwise dry songwriting, amid tracks of fairly ordinary routine, also helped by a world-music feel that's both understated and flaunted at the same time (“Planets Of The Universe”, “Bombay Sapphires”).

Between the two, Enchanted (1998) is a triple album collecting rarities that are at times better than the official tracks (though it doesn't include the single “If You Ever Did Believe” from the same year, included instead on the soundtrack of the fantasy film “Practical Magic”), while Soundstage Sessions (2009) is her first live album (aside from a “Live In Concert” VHS release from 1982).

After her self-titled debut, released when she still went by the surname Perfect, Christine McVie returns with the new, again self-titled album Christine McVie (1984), and twenty years later with the equally drab In the Meantime (2004).

Mick Fleetwood debuts in 1981 with The Visitor, reaffirming his obsession with the survival of the main band (two reworkings of classics, one from each era: Green's “Rattlesnake Shake” and Buckingham's “Walk A Thin Line”), followed by the mediocre I'm Not Me (1983, credited to Mick Fleetwood's Zoo) and Shakin' The Cage (1992, credited to The Zoo), before finally returning in 2004 with Something Big and, in 2009, with Blue Again (credited to Mick Fleetwood Band), once again devoted to the blues-rock era with Peter Green.

Lindsey Buckingham, predictably, is the only one to carry forward the aims of the shared project, while still indulging his own personal stylistic instincts. Law And Order (1981), with Mick Fleetwood on drums, is an awkward debut (though it boasts the languid hit “Trouble”), but with Go Insane (1984) he worthily continues the experiment of “Tusk”, in the “D.W. Suite”, but also in the sophisticated title track, in “Playing In The Rain” and in “Loving Cup”. Out Of The Cradle (1992), released after he left Fleetwood Mac, is his most singer-songwriterly and most erudite record. After a hiatus partly due to the reunion with the mother band, his comeback album, Under The Skin (2006), acoustic and played entirely by the author alone, is once again a collection of elegant easy-listening music. The lost album Gift Of Screws (2008), featuring old songs and reworked leftovers, is good only as a surface-level exercise. Seeds We Sow (2011) has no songs worth mentioning.

For bassist John McVie, we'll have to wait until 1992, with John McVie's Gotta Band With Lola Thomas.

Fleetwood Mac Live (1980), meanwhile, seals the band's saga on stage, revisiting classics alongside a few worthwhile unreleased tracks (chief among them the ballad “Fireflies”).

In 1982, Mirage comes out regardless, confirming Buckingham's underhanded game. The lineup is tighter than ever, and ready to relaunch itself on an international scale after the liberties and eccentricities of Tusk.

The album settles humbly into mainstream rules, but the flattening effect is especially heightened by arrangements that are at times downright crude: “Oh Diane” flirts with the Brill Building sound, “Only Over You” turns the cathartic dance of “Tusk” into McVie's diva poses, and Nicks settles for an already somewhat dated country-pop number like “That's Alright” (though “Gypsy” still boasts fluid grooves, even if its contribution seems to stem more from her solo career than from any group evolution).

Once again, the good-natured “Can't Go Back” is another calling card for Buckingham, and “Book Of Love” is another sonic trick, this time geared toward broad singalong appeal, but the only hit that can rival Rumours is really “Hold Me”.

A lesser sibling to the milestones just achieved, the album marks a clear rethink of Buckingham's direction.

The Rumours of the Eighties is really the following Tango In The Night (1987), the album with which – once again – the band updates its sound to the contemporary state of world pop (fashionable trends included).

The mood is lighter than ever, a bit like “Amigos” was for Santana, but the production, never so geared toward percussion and electronics, almost justifies talk of a “serious” turn. The irrepressible hook of “Little Lies” is one of their very best, and McVie's masterpiece (aided behind the scenes by Eddy Quintela), where a Bolivian echo of “Tusk” sets off Christine's plaintive vocal and – immediately – a fascination with vocal effects and liquid inflections, and a forceful choral refrain. Attesting to the keyboard-driven direction is also “Everywhere”, close to Abba's disco-pop, with a great deal of counterpoint work.

Nicks's ballads are also more grown-up, starting with “Seven Wonders” (written by Sandy Stewart), with icy, vibrant keyboards and accusatory tones that come close to even touching Springsteen. Then “Welcome To The Room”, again built on radio-friendly registers, anticipates “When I See You Again”, which is downright singer-songwriterly (or at least acoustic, with keyboard breaths and a gradual suspension in which the singer raises her vocal intensity).

For his part, Lindsey Buckingham once again lets his imagination run wild, or rather offers the eccentricities of Tusk in a more accessible form. The title track is built on the contrast between a mezzo-piano loop (with sighing vocals and harp) and a restless mezzo-forte chorus (with martial drums and disruptive electric guitar). “Caroline” dresses up a new South American cadence with silvery ticking, insistent electronic percussion and a doubled voodoo vocal that transfigures into a phantasmagoric chorus. “Big Love”, heavily percussive (almost sinisterly equatorial), pairs rampant guitar with clusters of drum rolls. But the true measure of his skill is found in “Family Man”, a double-time drum pattern vying for the spotlight with crisply articulated percussive interplay; the vocal delivery is even more possessed than elsewhere, almost psychotic, and the resulting acoustic jam in flamenco time opens up glimpses of world music.

The set is rounded out by songs that are polished through and through. "You And I" is a playful little tune that recalls the liveliest moments of Rumours, "Isn't Midnight" (in a brisk 2/2 tempo) alternates a synth-pop chorus with an anguished finale featuring a crackling solo and a flood of crystalline keyboards, and the placid, exotic bossa gait of "Mystified" unveils a tender melody with vocal-group flutters and Oriental touches in the background.

After this new burst of creativity, worthy of the best melodic albums of the year (and perhaps of the decade), Buckingham leaves the band. He will be replaced by guitarists Billy Burnette and Rick Vito.

The band's very short fourth era begins with Behind The Mask (1990), a work caught somewhere between a dreadful slab of commercial muzak and a watered-down rehash of Tango. The lowest point under the Fleetwood Mac name thus includes an AOR parody of "The Chain" ("In The Back Of My Mind"), a schizoid Nicks ("Freedom", one of her most spiteful melodies), and a sort of radio-friendly techno-rock ("Love Is Dangerous"). Everything else - rhythmic cohesion, melodies, vocals, harmonic structure - is literally flattened by a clumsy production.

The following Time (1995) is first and foremost a bruising commercial flop (for a name used to sailing on astronomical figures), but its content tries to move beyond the trivialities of Behind The Mask.

On its best tracks, Time corrects the course of the band's new era, or at least salvages its melodic and arrangement fortunes. Newcomer Bekka Bramlett, replacing Nicks and standing alongside Burnette (much as Buckingham had wanted Nicks by his side in the early days of Fleetwood Mac), delivers what could have been - with a less frigid production - worthy additions to their songbook. "Nothing Without You" is a vibrant piano-and-ecstatic-chorus R&B number, and "Dreamin' The Dream", bordering on a Christmas carol, rests on sweet lullaby-like arpeggios.

In "I Do", again with Quintela, the epic McVie of "You Make Lovin' Fun" returns, even if it doesn't land a truly good melody, while "Sooner Or Later" is an attempted imitation of a desert ballad in the vein of "The Chain", made passable by flamenco touches and layered harmonies ("I Got It In For You", on the other hand, misjudges everything with a hard-rock swagger).

From the nearly 7-minute new-age sprawl of "These Strange Times" to "All Over Again" (a full-fledged continuation of McVie's spectral streak that began with "Over And Over"), all the way to the jovial synthetic country of "Hollywood", the album ultimately tries to win over some of the 90s alternative-rock generation.

A tribute to the fan favorites from the record-breaking line-up comes in the form of The Dance (1997), one of the band's rare live albums, fittingly a bestseller among live records.

A quietly cherished cult act even in the underground (from Camper Van Beethoven - who in 1987 covered Tusk in its entirety - to the early Matthew Sweet, steeped in college-pop, right up to the New Pornographers), Fleetwood Mac, in both the Green era and the Buckingham era, were a present yet sometimes helpless spirit of sophisticated rock.

An honorable mention, in any case, goes to the passion of Mick Fleetwood, first a seeker and later the honorary president of an unforgettable, beloved institution - as adored by the public as it was scattered beyond any clear stylistic definition, aside from writing for the sake of writing, arranging for the sake of arranging.

Say You Will (2003) is the reunion album that brings back the classic line-up, a generous collection of songs (too often Nicks-oriented, from the new self-parodies of "Dreams" to the unlikely post-9/11 topicality of "Illume") serving mainly as a pretext to keep the fans happy.

The resulting world tour is indeed triumphant, so much so that in 2004 the reissue campaign (in expanded editions) of their best-known albums began: the self-titled 1968 record (retitled Original Peter Green's Fleetwood Mac for the reissue), Mr Wonderful, Pious Bird Of Good Omen, the self-titled 1975 album and Rumours. Almost all the new editions include bonus tracks or entire additional CDs of extra material. The more adventurous works, however, were overlooked: Tusk never received the same lavish treatment as Rumours, and Then Play On has been waiting for a reissue since 1988.

In 2008 the first "rumours" of a new reunion emerged, which materialized between February and March 2009, on the occasion of a new reissue (with DVD and previously unreleased material) of Rumours. The tour, which at the time only featured live performances of the classics with no new songs, did not include Christine McVie in the historic line-up.

In 2013 the Fleetwood Mac name made a surprise return with an Extended Play of brisk, youthful new material, even more surprisingly produced and released independently.

Among the notable anthologies, worth mentioning are the already-cited Vaudeville Years and The Best of Peter Green's Fleetwood Mac for the early period, and Greatest Hits (Warner, 1988) for the later one. The triple-disc 50 Years: Don't Stop (2018) is the only retrospective to bring together all of their eras in chronological order.

After the song was overused in a TV commercial for "Don't Stop," in 2012 a collaborative tribute to Rumours was organized via Facebook: Rumours Revisited (Mojo, 2013). Among the standout contributions are Julia Holter ("Gold Dust Woman"), Besnard Lakes ("You Make Lovin Fun") and Dutch Uncles ("Go Your Own Way"), each reworking the songs in their own distinctive style. In 2013, Then Play On finally gets a deluxe reissue courtesy of Rhino.

Forty years on from Rumours, Christine McVie finally decides to reunite artistically with Lindsey Buckingham. The two return to the studio with new material, once again backed by the rhythm section of old, John McVie and Mick Fleetwood. Stevie Nicks, initially on board for this announced reunion, pulls out at the last minute. The resulting album is therefore credited simply to Lindsey Buckingham/Christine McVie (2017), though it would have every right to be counted among the band's official discography. On one side, Buckingham carries on with his expertly crafted bubblegum ("Sleeping Around The Corner"), culminating in new takes on "Dreams" ("In My World"). On the other, McVie draws on her gift for enchanting muzak ("Red Sun", "Feel About You"), at times overdoing the sentimental itch. When the two combine, the result is also a dragging blues number, "Too Far Gone". There's still elegance and balance here, but the record occasionally pays the price - aside from Nicks' absence - for a production that's a touch too robotic, and above all for the defection of the acid counterpoint to their sound: Buckingham's electric guitar.

Nicks, meanwhile, returns with a politically charged track, "Show Them The Way" (2020), written and composed years earlier but never recorded, which also anticipates the release of Stevie Nicks 24 Karat Gold The Concert (2020), the concert film documenting her same-titled final tour from 2016-17.

Peter Green, one of the most important guitarists in rock music, passes away in July 2020. Mick Fleetwood commemorates him with a concert packed with high-profile guests

poi inciso in Celebrate The Music Of Peter Green And The Early Years Of Fleetwood Mac (2021).

Buckingham also makes his return with Lindsey Buckingham (2021), generic and bland - even more so than its title.

McVie settles for a personal compilation, Songbird (2022), drawing mostly from her solo albums. It will remain her last work released in her lifetime: she passes away a few months later at the age of 79.

Rumours Live (2023) documents the show at the Fabulous Forum in Inglewood on August 29, 1977, from the tour behind their best-seller. Live 1975 (2025) celebrates the fiftieth anniversary of the first tour of the Buckingham-Nicks era, unearthing the recording of the October 17 concert at the Jorgensen Auditorium.

Ride the wave of great music

Add OndaRock to your favorite sources on Google Discover. Don't miss our reviews, milestones and latest news straight in your feed.

Follow on Google