https://lasvegasweekly.com/ae/music/...e-mcvie-talks/
THE WEEKLY INTERVIEW: CHRISTINE MCVIE TALKS FLEETWOOD MAC RETURN AND BUCKINGHAM DUETS ALBUM
Image Buckingham and McVie team up at Park Theater on July 22. Photo: John Russo / Courtesy
Annie ZaleskiThu, Jul 20, 2017 (midnight)
Lindsey Buckingham and Christine McVie did something surprising this year: The Fleetwood Mac members released a duets album, Lindsey Buckingham/Christine McVie.
The Weekly connected with McVie in early June, a week before the album hit stores, to chat about revisiting old stomping grounds, rekindling creative connections and just how this record came to exist.
Obviously, you’ve made so many records with Lindsey Buckingham over the years. What was distinctive about the process of making this one? It happened sort of accidentally, but in quite an organic way. I’d sent Lindsey a couple of tracks that I’d written in my plinky-plonky way, with a piano, a drum machine and a voice. He sent them to his studio and did a bit of embellishment and arranged them and played them to me. He said, “Why don’t we go in and have some fun and just see if we can reconnect?” And of course, we did—instantaneously.
It was quite miraculous how that first week proved to us that this might be easier than we could have ever thought. When John [McVie] and Mick [Fleetwood] were in town, we asked them if they’d come and play with us. We did six or so new tracks, four of mine and two of Lindsey’s. We took the songs strung together and listened to them, and I thought, “We’ve nearly got a record here if we want it.”
We shelved them and started rehearsing for the Mac tour. Finished that—that was about two years—and then revisited those six songs and decided it would be quite fun to make a duets album.
What makes the two of you click so well as songwriters and musicians? Sometimes we don’t even need to say anything, he and I. We could just look at each other a certain way or nod, and somehow we could anticipate what we’re both gonna play, or react to the other person’s part.
It’s intangible. I don’t think we actually sat down together and co-wrote any of these tracks. We did, but not necessarily in the same room. There were bits from pieces of Lindsey’s takes of guitar ideas that he gave to me. I took them home and wrote melody and lyrics on them. And sometimes vice versa. It wasn’t like Elton John and Bernie Taupin at all. It was quite disorganized, really. We just had a ball.
What were your inspirations for the song “Carnival Begin”? It was a song I’d written about rejoining Fleetwood Mac. The words apply to exactly that journey, coming out of 16 years of retirement and back into the world of excessive rock ’n’ roll, fame, sparkly things. I just wanted to embrace that whole scene onstage, but with them. Because they’re all also such dear, dear old friends. They’re like brothers and sisters.
I saw you guys a couple times after you rejoined, and you looked like you were really having a blast onstage. We’re, to some degree, celebrating life. The fact that we’re all still alive. There have been no replacements. Even when I was gone, I wasn’t replaced. There was this reverent space where the keyboards used to be.
I also saw a Fleetwood Mac show when you weren’t with them, and though the playing was still wonderful, there was a difference. I think we all just compliment each other, because we’re such different writers. My contribution is the romance and the warmth. The love songs. Lindsey has his particular style of playing and writing, Stevie has hers. And then you combine all three voices when you start putting in harmonies and that incredibly powerful rhythm section. It’s a winner all the way around. People just love it. So do we.
“Game of Pretend” on the record is also one of yours. What was the inspiration behind that song? That’s about my therapist. He brought me out of the darkness into the light, from being quite chronically isolated—with a few more problems, to boot—to me starting to ask myself questions: “What do I want to do with my life? You’ve got to get to flying again.”
I’d been with him for two years and then he’d just become a great, dear, personal friend. It started off as a thank you to him. And then, as is wont with me, I sort of morphed it into a kind of love song. The choruses are sort of about him. It was a thanks to him for bringing me back into the world of the living.
You did some of the record at the LA studio the Village, where you’ve worked before. We recorded Tusk there, and Lindsey and I did our entire record there. We loved it. The sound in the room was unbelievable. We remembered it from back then, how great the sound was. And it just hasn’t changed a bit.
How did Mick and John help shape the sound of the new record? They have a specific style, and it’s very hard to define what that is. It’s all to do with where you place the beat, I’ve been told. It sounds like something you wouldn’t get in any other band, really. Having them on this record was magic. We’re so lucky we got them. But the band we have now is really amazing, too.
What will the shows on this tour be like? The purpose of going out to do this tour is to perform a lot of the new material, but we’re also going to do some old stuff. We’ll be playing a few well-known hits and a few lesser-known ones by Fleetwood Mac. I’m doing a song called “Wish You Were Here,” which is off the Mirage album.
We don’t want to start with the band slamming straight in, so Lindsey and I are going to sit down together and start the set with just he and I playing about four songs. And then the band comes in, and we start to rock ’n’ roll.
Lindsey Buckingham & Christina McVie with The Wallflowers. July 22, 8 p.m., $41-$146. Park Theater, 844-600-7275.