Disney Coming Home Write Up

[michelej1]

[Excuse the interruption. Just getting this old stuff online]

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (PA), August 28, 1993


Section: ENTERTAINMENT


DISNEY OFFERING A SUNDAY NIGHT MAC ATTACK


LEE WINFREY, PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER

President Clinton's favorite rock band, Fleetwood Mac, is past its peak of performance. But because a president's preferences always attract attention, Fleetwood Mac is the subject of a 90-minute profile on pay-cable television at 9 tomorrow night.

The host of the Disney Channel's "Fleetwood Mac: Going Home" is the band's drummer, Mick Fleetwood. Thirty-seven songs culled from the band's 18 albums are performed fully or in part.

Like Clinton, Fleetwood Mac has "managed to survive through hellish situations sometimes," as Fleetwood said in an interview last month. Just for starters, guitarist Peter Green, who founded the group in 1967, now has "controlled schizophrenia," said Fleetwood, although "he's got plenty of money to survive."

Green named the band for Fleetwood and bassist John McVie, the only original members who have been aboard for the band's entire 26-year roller-coaster ride. The band's peak period was 1975-87, when Fleetwood and McVie worked with vocalist Stevie Nicks, guitarist-vocalist Lindsey Buckingham and keyboardist-vocalist Christine McVie.

It was this grouping that Clinton invited to Washington to reunite for "Don't Stop (Thinking About Tomorrow)," a Fleetwood Mac song he used as a campaign theme, at a gala the night before his inauguration. Fleetwood said when he first heard Clinton use "Don't Stop" on the campaign trail, he thought, "That sounds like someone has ripped one of our songs off." But later, he said, he was pleased.

"It's not exactly Bob Dylan rhetoric going on" in "Don't Stop," Fleetwood said congenially. "It's basically optimistic, which is very much what the campaign turned out to be." The upbeat chorus, as you can hear tomorrow, goes like this:

"Don't stop thinking about tomorrow/Don't stop, it'll soon be here/It'll be here, better than before/Yesterday's gone, yesterday's gone."

Fleetwood says in "Going Home" that Christine McVie wrote "Don't Stop" for her husband, John McVie, who was feeling bad because their marriage was breaking up. She sings it to him on this special, wishing him well in this verse:

"All I want is to see you smile/Be at your best just a little while/Although you don't believe that it's true/I never meant any harm to you."

"Don't Stop" was a cut on Fleetwood Mac's biggest-selling album, "Rumours" (1977), a time of extraordinary turmoil even when measured against the rest of the band's turbulent history. Nicks and Buckingham were ending their love affair and for her he wrote "Go Your Own Way," another cut on "Rumours," which they duet on in "Going Home."

That didn't stop the couplings, though, not for Fleetwood Mac. Tonight while Nicks sings "Sara," a cut from a later album, Fleetwood says in voiceover, "I was seeing Stevie on a personal basis. Very much in love. It didn't work out. It was just too crazy for both of us."

One of the summits of "Going Home" is Nicks' intense rendition of her signature song, "Rhiannon." Christine McVie runs through several of her songs, including "Get Like You Used To Be" and "Over My Head." And there's some fine picking by the several guitarists who have come and gone during the band's history, including Green, Buckingham, Jeremy Spencer, Danny Kirwan and Bob Welch.

Mostly dormant in this decade so far, Fleetwood Mac hasn't put out an album since "Behind the Mask" (1990). Fleetwood said last month that he was assembling a new band and plans to be in a studio to record another album soon.

"I suppose you'll have to take me and John McVie out and shoot us to get rid of us," he said. After all that he and the Fleetwoods have already been through, he might be right.

[michelej1]

Richmond Times Dispatch Review of The Chain

February 4, 1993

***

In an era that saw some of rock's formative bands break-up, the rise and fall of disco, the annoying emergence of jazz/rock fusion and such assorted rock snores as the Pousette-Dart Band, Pablo Cruise and Little River Band, Fleetwood Mac's phenomenal rise may be through default.

It was the mid-'70s and the best place to find pop music with any muscle and brains was in the import bins. Oddly, Fleetwood Mac began as a good British blues band with some psychedelic accents. It was a band of impermanent membership. The rhythmic mainstays were drummer Mick Fleetwood and bassist John McVie.

Close to calling it a day, the band released a pop/rock album with new members guitarist/vocalist Lindsey Buckingham and vocalist Stevie Nicks. With his keen ear for melody and her bleating, tortured sheeplike voice, the album "Fleetwood Mac" sold millions. Its follow-up "Rumours" was a monster seller as well.

After sputtering to collapse a few years ago, Fleetwood Mac went their own way. Now they are back with a bloated, four disc tribute to a career as memorable for its banalities as it was for good songs. "Fleetwood Mac: 25 Years -- The Chain" (Warner Bros.) includes 72 songs. Slick, seamless pop with a pinpoint rhythm section and gossamer harmonies drove many of their songs to the top of the charts.

This collection opens with two new songs. "Paper Doll" is typical of Ms. Nicks' cloying drone. "Love Shines" is the type of pop song that made the band great. Christine McVie's voice romantically implores. Finely detailed guitars intertwine around Ms. McVie's voice and dynamically lift it toward a lushly melodic bridge.

The band's hits are all here. The Draconian reawakening of "Don't Stop" as a Democratic campaign theme, makes it a song played to excess twice in its lifespan. Other popular ditties include "Stand Back," "Say You Love Me," "Rhiannon," "Landslide," "Second Hand News," "The Chain," "Over My Head," "Sara," "Go Your Own Way," "Crystal" and "You Make Loving Fun."

The fourth disc is a study in contrasts. Exuberant blues and powerhouse rock comprise the majority of this disc. It is far removed from the style of smooth pop/rock where Fleetwood Mac found its success. Guitar great Peter Green led this early and, to long time fans, the best incarnation. "Black Magic Woman," "Albatross," "Rattlesnake Shake," "Oh Well, Part 1" and "Green Manalishi" are included.

Fleetwood Mac's Los Angeles period with guitarist Bob Welch is largely ignored. It is inexcusable that such songs as "Bare Trees," "Future Games" and "Show Me a Smile" were omitted. Instead, later insignificant songs or material from such forgettable albums as "Heroes Are Hard to Find" are included.

A four-disc box set priced at a premium should include some color, interesting graphics and an incisive history. "Fleetwood Mac: 25 Years -- The Chain" does not. It is smug to expect listeners to pay from $50 to $70 for it. Though well recorded with excellent digital transfers and a wealth of material (including some alternate versions), this set is designed for die-hard fans with big appetites.

(ljb) Altered Takes

[michelej1]

Seattle Post-Intelligencer (WA), January 13, 1993


Section: Entertainment

THANKS TO CLINTON, FLEETWOOD MAC HAS GOT TOMORROW ON ITS MIND


Marty Racine Hearst News Service

Fleetwood Mac is heeding its own admonition: ''Don't Stop.''

The longest-running soap opera in rock history has gone back into production as The Middle-aged and the Restless, thanks to an innocuous song that became an unofficial presidential campaign anthem.

Separated for two years and considered divorced, the Mac's most potent lineup of its storied 26-year career will perform at President-elect Bill Clinton's Inaugural Ball on Jan. 19. It's the first time that a rock band (English-bred, no less) has re-formed at the behest of an American president.

What's next, an album? A tour? A Cabinet post? Monthly rock 'n' roll concerts in the White House? The Mac camp hasn't said.

The development rekindles the love/hate relationships among Stevie Nicks, Christine McVie, Mick Fleetwood, John McVie and - astonishingly - Lindsey Buckingham. Buckingham stormed out of the group in 1987 following a 12-year period in which the Mac went from midlevel hard rockers to international superstars.

Buckingham's departure was supposedly irrevocable, the emotions too entwined for any reconciliation. He was replaced by guitarists Rick Vito, a veteran session ace, and Billy Burnette, son of '50s rockabilly cat Dorsey Burnette. The two were effectively gone after a 1990 tour.

That Fleetwood Mac would reunite should not be too surprising. The group has withstood numerous personnel changes, musical shifts, temporary breakups, drug binges, fiscal irresponsibility and its immigration to Los Angeles.

''We've had a lot of personal problems,'' Christine McVie told the Houston Chronicle in 1989. ''There's never been a dull moment in this band. At any given moment, there's some new melodrama.

''But I guess that's what keeps us going.''

Or what breaks a band apart.

Fleetwood Mac takes its name from founding members Fleetwood and John McVie. As drummer and bassist, respectively, they formed an impenetrable rhythm section that would go on to support a cast of lead singers and guitarists.

Established in 1967, they, like many English bands of the time, were a no-girls-allowed club that reshaped American blues with a rock 'n' roll attitude.

Where Led Zeppelin had Jimmy Page, Cream had Eric Clapton and the Yardbirds had Jeff Beck (and Page and Clapton) as star lead guitarist, the Mac had Peter Green. He was brilliant. As a true hippie, he rejected materialism, including that attending pop stardom.

He also was a quick burnout who lost his ambition and, some say, his senses. He went incommunicado for years.

Green was replaced by Danny Kirwin in 1969, who was succeeded by Robert Weston in 1972. Second guitarist Jeremy Spencer, a slide specialist, stayed on until 1971, when he suddenly bolted from a tour to join a religious cult. He was replaced by Bob Welch.

When Welch and Weston left at roughly the same period in the band's history, they were essentially replaced by Lindsey Buckingham, a studio whiz who grew up south of San Francisco. He brought along his girlfriend and cohort in the group Buckingham-Nicks, Stevie Nicks. It was not an easy decision to join the more popular Fleetwood Mac.

''I pretty much made the decision for both of us,'' Nicks told the Chronicle during her 1991 solo tour. ''I said to Lindsey, 'You know, we've worked awful hard since we were 18, and I'm kinda tired of (moonlighting as) a cleaning lady and a waitress. So I'm either going to go back to school or we should join Fleetwood Mac and give them everything that we can give them, put them back on the map.'

''I said, 'Right now Fleetwood Mac needs us as much as we need them.' I said a lot of prayers for it to work out.''

Nicks joined keyboardist Christine McVie, who had come aboard as Christine Perfect in 1969 before marrying John McVie, as co-vocalist.

Now based in California, this lineup gracefully eased Fleetwood Mac out of the blues through hard rock and into a sublime, intelligent blend of hard-rocking pop. Their 1975 self-titled album became the band's first No. 1 LP in the U.S. That was followed by ''Rumours'' ('77), one of the biggest-selling rock albums in history, with sales exceeding 20 million.

The band refused to stay put. As their record company looked on in horror, the members secluded themselves for weeks, then months, on end, fighting, loving, going crazy in the studio and emerging with ''Tusk.''

The adventurous, quirky double LP was met skeptically by press and audience, with sales of only about 4 million. The album, though, has stood the test of time.

The group's popularity had seemingly peaked. Two succeeding albums, a live double set and ''Mirage,'' were mere holding patterns.

But following a lengthy hiatus, the band proved again its drawing power with 1987's ''Tango in the Night.'' Buckingham contributed to the album, but left abruptly before the resultant tour.

After 1990's ''Behind The Mask,'' it was over. Time had passed them by, Vito and Burnette moved on to other projects, Nicks did a solo tour, and Fleetwood Mac had completed its marvelous run.

Until, that is, Clinton tapped ''Don't Stop'' as a theme. With the line, ''don't stop thinking about tomorrow,'' it addressed a baby-boomer candidate's central issue: the future.

For all he faces, the president-elect's tomorrow seems clearer than the rock band's.

[michelej1]

Dallas Morning News Review of the Chain, December 10, 1992

Fleetwood Mac

25 Years: The Chain

(Warner Bros., four discs, $72.98 list)

Summing up the career of a band that has lasted as long and had as many incarnations as Fleetwood Mac is a daunting task. But The Chain does an admirable job of synopsizing the dizzying array of identities the band has assumed.

Most heavily represented are the Lindsey Buckingham/Stevie Nicks years, which makes sense because they were involved with the band's longest-running and most successful era. Most of the radio hits from this period are here, often with alternate mixes indistinguishable from their originals. Silver Springs, the much-sought B-side to Go Your Own Way, is included, as are some live cuts that remind one of how odd and half-realized Fleetwood Mac's concert performances from this period were.

The period after Mr. Buckingham's departure also is covered, perhaps a bit too thoroughly, and includes four new songs. Fleetwood Mac's blues roots -- particularly the Peter Green beginnings -- are delved into, and it is surprising to hear grungy numbers like Rattlesnake Shake and realize that another version of this band turned out the polished Go Your Own Way.

Although the band's origins and later work are well-covered, the middle period of Fleetwood Mac's career is touched on only briefly. Although he was only with the band four more-or-less hitless years, Bob Welch's idiosyncratic contributions to the group's sound deserves more attention than the inclusion of Hypnotized and a handful of other tracks.

PACKAGING: The accompanying booklet is disappointing, consisting only of pictures and a few lists, the assumption being that the story of Fleetwood Mac, like that of John Henry, is known to everybody. But people buy box sets for these booklets -- to see rare photos, learn something new about a beloved band -- and the decision to fling just a handful of photos at the buyer comes off as arrogant.

BOTTOM LINE: Fleetwood Mac is, essentially, John McVie and Mick Fleetwood. Together, they form a seamless rhythm section that others drift in and play in front of, adding their own unique stylings. The Chain is an illustrative sampling of the range of flavors this approach has produced over the years. Devotees will appreciate the breadth of this offering, and the more casual listener, drawn in by the familiar, may be pleasantly enlightened.

-- Matt Weitz

[michelej1]

Miami Herald Review, The Chain, December 6, 1992

* Fleetwood Mac, 25 Years -- The Chain, Warner Bros. ($55- $73)

OK, this four-CD set isn't everything it could have been. It's expensive and lacks insightful liner notes. The early '70s lite-rock era, featuring singer/guitarist Bob Welch, is under- represented.

That said, The Chain still represents Southern California rock at its catchiest and sunny best. The 72 tracks range from the sweet love songs of the ever-reliable Christine McVie (Songbird, You Make Loving Fun and her newest, Heart of Stone, the best Fleetwood Mac song in more than a decade) to the intensely haunting Stevie Nicks compositions (Gold Dust Woman, Sara, Dreams) and the studio perfectionism of Lindsey Buckingham (Second Hand News, Big Love).

Disc No. 4 crackles with energy as it documents early blues and rock with Peter Green and Danny Kirwan on guitars, anchored by the precise rhythm section of Mick Fleetwood and John McVie. Sound quality is immaculate. -- H.C.

[Villavic]

I've always read that Coming home is one of the best documentaries about Fleetwood Mac. Is it in youtube? (parts of it, I mean).. Is there any way to get it? I've seen several docs, but never this.

[David]

Originally Posted by michelej1

That said, The Chain still represents Southern California rock at its catchiest and sunny best.

Sunny??
Is H.C. Howard Cohen?

[priestofnothing]

Originally Posted by Villavic

I've always read that Coming home is one of the best documentaries about Fleetwood Mac. Is it in youtube? (parts of it, I mean).. Is there any way to get it? I've seen several docs, but never this.

Here is a 5 minute preview. If you log in to the site (VeohTV), you can watch or download it in its entirety.


Online Videos by Veoh.com