Love, Hate and Betrayal (Express co.uk)

[michelej1]

Express Co.UK
By: Anna Pukas
Published: Fri, February 8, 2013
http://www.express.co.uk/news/showbi...-Fleetwood-Mac

Love, hate and betrayals of Fleetwood Mac

WITH Fleetwood Mac and their best-selling album making a comeback, we reveal the truth behind Rumours...


In February 1976 Fleetwood Mac were at the top of their game. Their 10th album released the previous year had sold four *million copies. Now the band – drummer Mick Fleetwood, bassist John McVie, his keyboards player and singer wife Christinalito McVie, guitarist-singer Lindsey Buckingham and singer Stevie Nicks – were gathered at Record Plant, a recording studio in Saus Northern California, to start work on the follow-up.

But for all their success, away from the music their lives were a mess. All five were going through painful break-ups – mostly with each other.

After nearly eight years John and Christine McVie had called time on their marriage and Christine was already involved with the band’s lighting engineer. The Americans Lindsey Buckingham and Stevie Nicks who had been together since school were splitting up amid much acrimony. Drummer Mick Fleetwood was newly divorced from model Jenny Boyd *(sister of Patti, who was married to George Harrison) and was about to complicate things by embarking on a two-year affair with Stevie Nicks.


You anaesthetised yourself emotionally. The wound was cauterised but underneath was chaos. Fleetwood Mac became the bandage to keep it all wrapped up

Mick Fleetwood

Yet out of this chaos, brilliance emerged. Look at any Best Albums of All Time list and Fleetwood Mac’s 11th album Rumours is there. First released in 1977 it reappears in the charts every few years. Bill Clinton chose a Fleetwood Mac hit Don’t Stop (Thinking About Tomorrow) as his campaign signature tune when he ran for president. In 2011 the TV show Glee devoted an episode to songs from Rumours. And this very week Rumours was at number three in the album charts in anticipation of *tickets going on sale today for the band’s reunion tour (minus Christine McVie who retired in 1998 and has made it clear she cannot be coaxed out).

But 37 years ago all anyone was concerned with was how they were going to get past the personal messiness in order to make the album. On the one hand Buckingham and Nicks argued constantly while the McVies gave each other the silent treatment.

“John and I just didn’t talk,” recalls Christine McVie, now 69. “My boyfriend at the time was not welcome at the studio for obvious reasons. Stevie and Lindsey didn’t get on well either but they used to fight except when they were writing songs together. But John and I never wrote together. We just did not talk at all. Apart from basic civilities like asking what key is this song in, we spent six months avoiding each other.”

John McVie, now 67, admits he was heartbroken. “You have the pressure of being on the road and living together. You’re seeing everybody at their best and their worst and Christine saw me at my worst one time too many. And bless her heart she said, ‘Enough. I don’t want to be around this person.’ Now we are good friends but at the time it was awful.”

For Mick Fleetwood, who with McVie was an original member of the band founded by guitarist Peter Green and named after his two friends, making Rumours was his escape from the pain of his divorce. “You anaesthetised yourself emotionally. The wound was cauterised but underneath was chaos. Fleetwood Mac became the bandage to keep it all wrapped up.”

Buckingham and Nicks were more mercurial. Ken Caillat, who produced the album and later wrote a book about the experience, recalled how they were able to switch their anger on and off during recording.

“Stevie and Lindsey were sitting on two stools out in the studio, each in front of a microphone, working on background parts, singing, ‘You make lovin’ fun, you make lovin’ fun…’ When I stopped the tape to rewind it Stevie suddenly looked at Lindsey and cried out, ‘**** you, asshole. You can go to hell.’ Lindsey responded with a tirade of his own. ‘When we get back to LA, I’m moving out.’ ‘I don’t want to live with you, either.’ They went back and forth, screaming at each other.”

Caillat continues: “I couldn’t rewind the tape fast enough. When I got to the beginning of the tape, I hit record. Stevie and Lindsey looked at each other. Then they turned toward their microphones and right on cue, in the middle of a fight, nailed their parts. I was flabbergasted.

“There was the constant pain of ‘he cheated on me’ or ‘he’s leaving me’. John McVie would come into the *studio and see Christine after she’d left him for someone else. And every time John would see her it would just kill him. He still wanted her but she didn’t want him because of his drinking. There was constant drama.”

To make matters worse recording suites in Record Plant were small and windowless. No one ever knew whether it was night or day, although with drugs on tap no one much cared after a while.

When it came to vices Caillat says the band divided according to nationality. The English members – Mick Fleetwood and John McVie – were boozers while the Californians – Buckingham and Nicks – were pot-smoking hippies. “Then cocaine entered the picture,” says Caillat.The budget was open-ended and the cocaine kept coming.

Chris Stone, co-owner of Record Plant, says: “The band would come in at 7pm, have a big feast, party till one or two in the morning and then when they were so whacked out they couldn’t do anything, they’d start recording.”

The band never socialised *outside the studio. But while they were *certainly not talking to each other, they were communicating, pouring their feelings out in their song * lyrics. John McVie came up with the album’s title because he said they were all telling their stories to each other.

In Dreams, Stevie Nicks muses wistfully on winning her lover back while Go Your Own Way is Lindsey Buckingham’s rebuff to his *one-time lover. Christine McVie wrote You Make Lovin’ Fun about her new lover.

How were they able to sing those words with the lovers they had hurt standing beside them? Mick Fleetwood likens the situation to a divorced couple putting on a united front in public for their child’s sake. “You break up but you want to do the right thing, not to hurt the *children. The album was our baby. That’s what made an impossible thing possible.”

Not only possible but stupendously successful. Out of pain came much gain.

[Lilyfan]

I have to get Callait's book. Wow.

[WildHearted]

Originally Posted by michelej1

In Dreams, Stevie Nicks muses wistfully on winning her lover back

I always thought it was more like: "Have fun being lonely. One day you'll wake up and realize how royally your life sucks without me. Hah."

Also, yet again Christine mentions Stevie and Lindsey writing songs together. I guess she's just talking about him working on her arrangements. Unless they've been lying to us all these years.

[michelej1]

Originally Posted by WildHearted

I always thought it was more like: "Have fun being lonely. One day you'll wake up and realize how royally your life sucks without me. Hah."

I know that telltale heartbeat driving you mad as you contemplate what you had and what you lost.

Michele

[Dragonfly]

There is also a very nice photo of Stevie (have never seen it before, looks to be Tusk era with her in a white floaty dress showing quite a bit of leg) in the 'Richard and Judy' column in The Daily Express today (Saturday).

Unfortunately the photo is different in the online version, but same words.

http://www.express.co.uk/comment/col...fe-of-it-s-own

[Sanne2]

Originally Posted by Dragonfly

There is also a very nice photo of Stevie (have never seen it before, looks to be Tusk era with her in a white floaty dress showing quite a bit of leg) in the 'Richard and Judy' column in The Daily Express today (Saturday).

Unfortunately the photo is different in the online version, but same words.

http://www.express.co.uk/comment/col...fe-of-it-s-own

The photo sounds very interesting, could you maybe take a picture of it?

[Dragonfly]

Originally Posted by Sanne2

The photo sounds very interesting, could you maybe take a picture of it?

I have taken a photo of it on my smartphone but not sure how I can post it here??

It is very similar to the main photo on this page, only her right hand is in a different position.

http://blogue.us/2010/08/09/fashion-...tevienicks4-2/

[Lilyfan]

Originally Posted by Lilyfan

I have to get Callait's book. Wow.

So, I spent all weekend reading Ken's book and CAH's book (thank you Kindle!). Wow! I do believe that CAH insinuated that Stevie had an affair with Ken and broke up his engagement. I found that interesting. It seemed that Ken's book contradicted CAH's book on several timeline issues. I wonder which one is more accurate

[michelej1]

Originally Posted by Lilyfan

So, I spent all weekend reading Ken's book and CAH's book (thank you Kindle!). Wow! I do believe that CAH insinuated that Stevie had an affair with Ken and broke up his engagement.

Really? I overlooked that inference completely. Michele

[Lilyfan]

Originally Posted by michelej1

Really? I overlooked that inference completely. Michele

I think I probably only caught it because I read the books back to back. I read Ken's book first and then the book by CAH. The first thing I noticed was that CAH had a tendency to compress time and then sometimes expand time. I'll see if I can find the quotes that made me think that way.

[michelej1]

Originally Posted by Lilyfan

I think I probably only caught it because I read the books back to back. I read Ken's book first and then the book by CAH. The first thing I noticed was that CAH had a tendency to compress time and then sometimes expand time. I'll see if I can find the quotes that made me think that way.

Yes, I know that CAH has a massive time problem in her book. People say that not everything can be accurate and it's no big deal, but she indicated that she was not just writing from memory but from contemporaneous diaries she kept at the time, so I find the inconsistencies odd, since she says she was referring to writings and audio tapes that were, presumably, dated.

I agree with you about the tendency to compress and expand time. Obviously, since Ken was dealing with such a finite time frame in the FM history, I think he would be more reliable when it comes to when things happened. I was just saying that I completely missed the fact that CAH may have hinted that Stevie had an affair with Ken. That escaped me.

Michele

[Lilyfan]

Originally Posted by michelej1

. I was just saying that I completely missed the fact that CAH may have hinted that Stevie had an affair with Ken. That escaped me.

Michele

What made me notice it is the fact that I had just read his book and in her book she seems to avoid mentioning him. She mentions Richard and then refers to something like a second-tier engineer or engineer's assistant - something snide like that.

Then when she talks about the Tusk cover she refers to it as a stray dog that bit someone's pants, again with the attitude. Ken identifies the dog and shows other pictures of it in his book.

CAH towards the end of her book refers to Stevie as having been involved with some vague description of an assistant engineer again and that Stevie broke the guys heart and the heart of his fiance'.

It just felt to me that she was using the same phrasing to probably refer to the same person. Especially since she went out of her way to talk about the fact that she had wanted to be a sound engineer and that she constantly stressed that she was an insider in the FM "family". It seemed that she went out of her way to avoid mentioning Ken at all. His book directly contradicts her book on several points - timeline being one of them. I could be wrong

[michelej1]

Originally Posted by Lilyfan

What made me notice it is the fact that I had just read his book and in her book she seems to avoid mentioning him. She mentions Richard and then refers to something like a second-tier engineer or engineer's assistant - something snide like that.

Then when she talks about the Tusk cover she refers to it as a stray dog that bit someone's pants, again with the attitude. Ken identifies the dog and shows other pictures of it in his book.

Very interesting and, as you say, reading them back to back is probably very illuminating and so you are in a great position to compare them. I read CAH's years ago, so I would have forgotten little details like that. I think CAH and Ken are friendly though and she is one of the people he thanks in his book.

Michele

[Lilyfan]

Originally Posted by michelej1

Very interesting and, as you say, reading them back to back is probably very illuminating and so you are in a great position to compare them. I read CAH's years ago, so I would have forgotten little details like that. I think CAH and Ken are friendly though and she is one of the people he thanks in his book.

Michele

hmmm. All this stuff happened so many years ago I can see how they could be friendly now. He never talks unfavorably about her in his book. It just seemed that he kept detailed notes of the band's activities as part of his job and so I trust his dates more. It just seemed odd to me.

I was shocked at LB's violence in both the books.