Quote:
Originally Posted by SteveMacD
Christine is the only person who could have joined Fleetwood Mac after Peter quit.
Unlike Danny or Jeremy, she’d been the center of attention in Chicken Shack, even though it was Stan’s band. Of the first four Chicken Shack singles, three were Christine’s, while she only got two songs on the first album and four on the second. It was big enough to get her a solo stint she wishes we’d forget about.
She’d been playing on Fleetwood Mac albums since April, 1968, ten months after the band formed, and was John’s wife within a year of the band’s debut gig. Actually, they were married before Danny was officially in the band.
And, as a result, she was a massive part of their inner circle.
Jeremy and Danny strike me as having been especially fragile, and bringing in someone, i.e. Jeff Beck, wasn’t going to fly.
Adding Christine wasn’t adding someone new, but it was adding someone who they were comfortable with and who’d already dealt with the pressure if being the focal point in a band. She was exactly what they needed and the only way they could move beyond Peter Green.
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Not bad, this analysis, not bad at all. I have to somewhat disagree, though, on the thesis of Christine having been "the center of attention in Chicken Shack". This is dependent on the angle from which one is looking at that band.
As I'd already pointed out, I certainly share this view in musical terms. But one mustn't forget that Stan Webb has always been a kind of eccentric and pretty egotistic character. And so he sort of "used" Christine in the band in a way, that was beneficial for himself on one hand and the musical aspects of the Shack on the other. What I mean is this: Of course he was aware of her musical potential and power and the way the band would benefit from that. That was furthermore helped by the fact of Christine being a rather attractive female band member. Nevertheless he always kept an eye on Christine not getting in the way of the "star" role he saw himself in.
Her part in 45 releases of CS - that was to CATCH the attention. On the LPs this looked quite different - Stan made sure to have the lion's share of attention there to himself. Even more so on stage.
There's a concert video of CS live in France 1968 on a double bill with "The Gun". They played a mere half hour 5-song set. Webb wouldn't let Christine be featured singing AT ALL . . . or even playing only one single solo chorus! Would you believe that?! I also remember reading a concert review once, where the author mentioned that Christine only got to sing the odd number in order to get Mr. Webb a breather for a while.
And then there's Webb's mostly dreadful guitar soloing. There's good reason for him not being mentioned in a row with the really remarkable Brit guitar heroes - because he never could compete up there with them. Instead he put on some mock virtuosity, additionally trying to mask his shortcomings with uninspired use of a wah-wah pedal and his "famous" stage antics like walking into the crowd by way of an over-dimensionally long cable - all this just to draw attention permanently on himself.
To cut a long story short: By the time Christine had earned her Melody Maker award, her stint with CS has been over since 5 months already. To the average consumer it's always been STAN WEBB's CS - only the real blues aficionados appreciated the fact that Christine was the true secret weapon, and quite rightly so . . . even more in hindsight, and certainly in a group like this here, where Christine is the topic.