The Essential Christine...
 

Nice article from WBUR...

http://artery.wbur.org/2015/01/27/ch...-fleetwood-mac

Its lovely to hear Christine being so lauded.
I think this writer only owns Rumours though.

Wrong. She was brought on because the band needed a keyboard player and another singer/songwriter. She was a very experienced player in both studio and live settings, had a huge reputation in England, and brought another style of singing and songwriting to the band at a time when they were reeling from the loss of Peter Green. Saying she only joined because she was married to John is a real insult.

I know what you mean. And agree. But I think the writer was simply trying to say had she not been married to John and living with the rest of them, none of them, including her, would have thought about her joining the band. She was simply there while they rehearsed. They needed to "fill out the sound" (as stated in several older articles). Had she not been with them, had she been an unmarried woman with, say, Chicken Shack, they wouldn't have thought about asking her to join them. It was really just fate, a casual decision, as casual as the introductions of Welch and then Buckingham-Nicks into the band.

"The recording sessions were rambling, coke-fueled affairs, fraught with interpersonal melodrama."

Aren't all recording sessions rambling, coke-fueled affairs, fraught with interpersonal melodrama?

Seriously, though, nice little appreciation article—of the type that you don't expect to see anymore because today's article writers are getting younger and younger, and thus lack that frame of reference that allows you to look at McVie's instrumental style more closely.

I forgot! Welcome back to Doug, a ghostly apparition from the ancient past!

Thank you for posting!

Was this not a article lauding Christine talents? I don't see it as insult, or that the writer was implying nepotism. It's uncertain if Fleetwood Mac was actually searching for a singer/keyboard player. It was simply a matter of circumstance. With Peter gone, they recorded Kiln House. Christine designed the album cover and sang some backgrounds, and joined the band for the subsequent tour. She became an official member after Jeremy left, and Bob Welch joined.

It was a natural assimilation, made easier since she she was in a relationship with John. The writer inferred that their relationship had something to do with it. As a minor technicality, that is true. But he was not suggesting nepotism, as if the only credentials she had was that she was married to John. (John Lennon bringing Yoko into the Beatles sessions comes to mind for some reason!)