I was just recently listening to the BTM interviews after LB left and she talked about how necessary touring is and how she loved performing.. :lol:

I saw one of those! The irony was not lost on me. :lol:

I think she is starting to enjoy the performance again - it's maybe just the travel aspect which puts her off. Just look at how much she enjoyed, and smiled through, the two London performances. She also seemed to love the Maui gig.

I agree. Though I don't think it's much of a a fear of performing (though she does get stage fright too) as it was being tired of it. And of course, the logistics and all the drudgery that goes with it. She's getting back that enjoyment from performing this year, and it shows.

A year no longer feels like a year. Especially when you are having fun. Sobreity will give her the time to see the world in ways she never took the time before.


She said in that recent interview that what she thought she wanted for her life at home turned into something she really did not want for herself. After therapy I believe she has come to the conclusion that her destiny is touring and recording music. I believe all musicians will continue to perform as long as there is a paying audience, until the day they die.
Even before Stevie announced in the pre tour interviews that this was not the last FM tour, I was telling friend's the same thing when they'd ask me about that. When I was in my teens, 20's & 30's my current age seemed ancient but now that I am over(cough, cough) 50, I realize that age is just a number and that if one has good health they will be inclined to keep working. Working is good for the soul. Retirement is nice if you have a lot of hobbies.
Chris has just had a 15 year vacation and to her it probably felt like 5 years. After age 40 you will watch your years fly by like a whip through the air.

I sometimes wonder how she would deal with the whole working thing while sober. Maybe the therapy and perhaps wherever she sought help to stop the drinking taught her some healthier coping mechanisms. Or perhaps turn her into another substance, like tea or coffee. :laugh: (maybe she's given up smoking too. Hope so. *crosses fingers*)

I agree that she probably realized this now. :nod: I'm surprised it took this long before she went stir crazy and started to seek the help she needed. Next thing we know, she would have several projects lined up for her for the next couple of years. :laugh:

And she's 70 years old. She must have known that time is short. Might as well make the most of it and do what she loves doing best.

See that's the thing I was trying to convey earlier. My mother is 86 and most people think she is in her 60's. She has more energy than God and has all her faculties. She drives like the maniac she always did and has a fully functional social life. She has never had the flu in her entire life. I've had the flu 3 times. She takes no medication as her health is perfect. We expect her to live to be 100, easily. So if 100 is my mom's time to go or Christine's time, what might Chris be doing to keep herself busy for the next 30 years? Time may not be short.

All of the Rumours 5 of them lived through their 60s and 70s despite drugs, alcohol, and whatever else comes with the rock and roll lifestyle, so who knows how much time?

...and going off-topic here, but I keep getting a mental image of Christine dressed as Sister Jude from AHS: Asylum for Halloween. I think she can pull it off.

I think it's a mistake to equate Christine's dislike/hatred of touring (i.e. travelling) with some sort of dislike/fear of performing. I've seen her in concert a handful of times, and watched plenty of FM/Christine clips, and it always looks like she's enjoying performing. I honestly think it's the grind of all that travel that she abhorred.

Another thing that baffles me is the idea that a "tour" would have to be a multi-continent, year-long slog. Plenty of bands do short tours. Three or four cities, a week on the road. Done. If it worked, three months later, do it again. Couldn't they abandon their delusions of grandeur and act like a normal group of five musicians? (Speaking of which, wouldn't it be sweet if they told the backing musicians and vocalists to go away, and did a show, just the five of them, but I suppose that's an impossibility.)

While I definitely agree that she clearly hated the grind of touring, she has also said in one of the ITM interviews that being onstage made her "feel a little dizzy under the lights", though probably not to the extent that the drudgery of touring and living out of a suitcase does.

Tell that to Mick. :laugh: Actually I wish for even like four or five shows of just the five of them performing their hearts out.

I agree with applebucked here. There were several interviews circa 2004 in which she confessed to suffering from a form of stage fright. John mentioned in 2009 that she had let them know that she was uncomfortable 'on the boards' and 'under the lights'. She would presumably otherwise have joined them to do Don't Stop in London on the Say You Will tour when they broached the subject with her.

I think that if they wanted to they of course could do a short tour not travelling far, or they could take up the idea which Roger Waters had for the never-to-be Pink Floyd reunion in 2006 by having a couple of big shows in each of about five key cities around the world, spaced out and allowing time to settle at each venue for a while. However, I think they want the revenue from a big tour and they / their managers simply won't reduce the scale, probably for ego reasons as much as financial reasons. As much as LB often tries to do things for creative reasons, I get the impression that the Machine (i.e. the managers, the label(s) etc) will always say 'Go big, and go commercial'.

It's not called the Big Mac Machine for no reason. :laugh: Their egos wouldn't be able to handle a short tour.