nah it started long before The Dance (1997)

Ive been listening again recently to her Bella Donna tour concert (1981) and was reminded how much Rhiannon even then had already become very tame and middle-aged. No spark at all; all canned. Yes, I know that wasn't FM, but it's her song and she could have done it anyway she wished without the burden of FM, and she went with a watered down version that really isn't that different to The Dance version. Things spiced up a bit as the coke habit grew more intense, but she had already lost her ability to do Rhiannon as originally done (without mountains of coke) by the early 80s. Even Dreams had grown lame by then too.

Stevie in her twenties was the most charismatic American rock star since Jim Morrison ..had he lived to his thirties he couldn't have kept it up either.

So, you’re saying the LBT version isn’t neutered/watered down compared to the ‘77-‘82 versions? I think you’re alone on that.

cute Steve, cute. #WhatAboutism

i'm pointing out that the 2 LB/LBT versions of the Chain - backstage acoustic and then live one - are fantastic.

as a response to that you keep saying but but but but but....... there are different wilder better versions out there, by the classic Mac themselves, when they were young, high and free from any scripts. nobody is arguing that or trying to compare all those versions but you. and you are doing that because you cannot argue that LB/LBT version is not fantastic. :)

I just think the band really went wild with it in 1982. And she was definitely completely insane and amazing for that whole show. IMO. Gypsy is the clunker, but it always is.

The live versions of all songs were changed during the Dance era. I would not call it "watering" down although I can see why someone would say that. Fleetwood Mac like bands in the late 90s used technology that helped them create a live sound much more similar to the album versions. Stevie's Stop Draggin My Heart Around in 2017 had very little rock edge compared to her early 80's versions. Over My Head used to rock in the 70s when they played it. When the Mac started playing it again in the late 90s, that arena rock sound was gone and we got something similar to the album version.

I have always said I loved arena rock and 1990 was the last of it with the Mac as well as other bands. I much prefer the raw rocking sound compared to the tame technology based sound.

$he took monotony to a new level. So bland.

I love the Live album version of OMH. That "drop D" guitar intro is f*cking awesome!

I hate it that bands decided they had to sound exactly like the albums. Adding an orchestra of players/playing with tracks.
Mirage was the last time they were even close to being an actual BAND.

Both of those versions were fabulous. The LBT collaboration also couldn't be as long bc of television but it was electric! They blended one of LBT's songs with The Chain. The crowd went wild and LBT was clearly thrilled to be performing with Lindsey.
I hate how The Chain was played on the Evening with Fleetwood Mac In Concert Tour. I saw 3 shows.
Mike's solo sounded like a high school battle of the bands. Also Neil had no captivating stage activity. He jumped around. So does Nils Lofgren. He got up on Mick's drum platform which was a copy of Lindsey, except he didn't play the cymbals. Maybe Neil didn't crank it up bc they're not his songs.
When I saw them do his song I Got You, he did this weird tag game with Stevie and I couldn't wait for the song to end.

Some folks on this platform think they're the be all and end all of everything FM. Send in your application to Stubner and sheryl louis already, right?

yeah on other forums i saw a number of posts from Neil Finn fans who hated his turn with FM, felt he was muzzled and not anything like what they love about him live, and they couldn't wait for him to go on the road on his own terms. i was looking forward to I Got You and like you said, it was totally butchered. Neil's turn with Mac definitely soured CH and SE for a good number of people. hope the money and a few more people hearing his name was worth it to him.

haha re some folks offering themselves up for jobs in mac PR. i had the same thought reading some of those posts, especially when someone is twisting themselves into pretzels and throwing away any shreds of credibility trying to prove something they cannot really believe to be true.

This has got to be one of the most humiliating moments in Fleetwood Mac 's long and at times sordid history. Right up there with the incident in 1974 when their former manager toured another fake version of Fleetwood Mac.

I was way too young to understand any of this at the time, but clearly something happened during the 80's because a lot of bands made this pivot at the time. I'm a pretty big Stones fan and the concert approach from 1981/82 as compared to their 1989-90 tours are indescribably different. They added a mini-band behind them and approached their catalog with the intent to mimic as best as possible, the sound of the album recording. Stones fans lament the change to the "Vegas-era" of the Stones in 1989 as compared to their live approach from 1969-82.

My take has been that the bands were older, the audience was older, there were less drugs and the ticket prices were much much higher. Middle-aged (and now senior citizen) baby boomers had, and were willing to shell out, larger dollars to see their heroes and relive a piece of their youth for one night...but were going to be a lot more critical of bands playing loose with the live performances. I don't know if I'm right at all, but just a theory I have had on it.

Personally, as someone who was born two months after those last Tusk shows at the Hollywood Bowl, it's a hell of a lot more interesting today listening to bootlegs off of the Tusk Tour with their varied approaches and outputs vs. any bootleg off of the Say You Will or On With the Show Tours with their standardized, sanitized, and consistent performances. Of course, the band isn't really going to a give a crap about me listening on YouTube vs. the paying audience getting their one night at the local hockey rink with their favorite band sounding "just like they did 40 years ago!"

Compare Over My Head from Live to the performance on The Dance DVD. Blah to the latter.

I always thought opening for...who was it, REO Speedwagon (?) on the county fair circuit in '94 was the bottom of the barrel for the post-1975 Fleetwood Mac. Yes, even worse than their 2018 "rebirth" :rolleyes:

That is up there too..but what can you expect for a tour preceding an album that did not even make the Billboard 200 after Rumours had sat atop it for seven months and with none of the 3 big "Rumours" singers doing the shows either.

I'm in agreement that I think with people willing to pay the premium prices for shows, the live experience changed. You had the Stones sounding more like they were in a recording studio on the Steel Wheels/Urban Jungle Tour than on a stage. I will say, I think they really let loose on the Bigger Bang Tour and even some on the 50 & Counting Tour. I was at the show where they debuted Emotional Rescue and it sounded so FRESH.
Totally with you on the mini band too. I think in 89 they added Lisa, Bernard, Chuck. Now, I think they added more horns and they actually have 2 keyboard players. Maybe that was just to play She's a Rainbow:D