Bob Welch has died

[chiliD]

Originally Posted by Tango

I am so sorry to hear/read of the loss of Bob. The first real picture of his personality came through to me here on The Penguin. The two Q&As he did with all the fans are amazing. Steve, not sure if you heard about this yet, but I already know you will take this loss hard with quite a few others here. Clearly Bob Welch respected and enjoyed you in particular-- and I think he loved interacting directly with the fans. He got to tell his story of Fleetwood Mac without any editing. I'm glad that he got to do that here.

Thank you. I heard about this fairly early in the afternoon, but for some reason, the last couple of weeks I haven't been able to access The Ledge from my work computer (the only Fleetwood Mac site that I haven't been able to)...so I had to wait until now to drop by here.

This is very difficult. Time has healed the wounds of losing two Beatles which affected me deeply...but this is a fresh open wound, still. What makes this different is that there was a personal connection between myself & Bob...yeah, it's documented on the Q&As here...and we'd met in person a couple of times, but nothing significantly...just a nod of the head & a smile...or an adoring guitarhead fan trying to pick up every nuance of his guitar work, his stage presence, his lyrical content while seated at his feet in the audience of either a Fleetwood Mac, Paris or solo band show.

As I've posted here numerous times (to where in order to save keystrokes & ease the carpal tunnel aches, I now just "copy & paste" from a saved Word document) in the always recurring "How did you become a Fleetwood Mac fan?" threads, I'd been an avid Fleetwood Mac fan for a number of years before Bob joined, but the transition wasn't really as drastic as it happened as it appears when looking back in retrospect. What really cemented my bond with Bob's tenure in Fleetwood Mac was finally getting to see the band in person for the first (and second) times during those tumultuous Heroes Are Hard To Find days, weeks, months. I already had eaten up the "spookiness" of Bob's lyrical content on a few songs over the course of the previous few albums, but none of it hit home and opened my mind as seeing him present it all in person. I was sad when he left Fleetwood Mac, but I easily fell back into line when Paris hit the road & the album into record stores. Then when he was peripherally brought back into the Fleetwood Mac orbit with Mick as his manager for French Kiss, Three Hearts, The Other One, etc...it was full circle.

The Q&A was a major highlight...he was talking DIRECTLY TO ME! (as I see he has posted here earlier in this thread, a huge THANK YOU to "Penguin Emeritus" Marty Adelson for being the one to facilitate that and provide the connection for that to happen!)

Then on email, Bob's own site(s) & eventually Facebook pages, we had numerous one-to-one correspondences. That he took the time to respond to my messages meant more to me than I can express in words.

[HomerMcvie]

You know, a Ledgie (who rarely posts anymore) and I were texting tonight, about Bob's death. Then about how we've lost 3 of them in the past year....

They're all getting up there, when it's going to become more common. And that really makes me so sad. They are literally the soundtrack to my life. And we do all forget that they are just flesh and bone like the rest of us, and will expire. God, they've been a driving force in my life, since I was 14(and that's some time ago). Friends from high school STILL call me, and say "I just heard a FM song on the radio, and HAD to call you!" I was probably known for my FM obsession, more than anything...

God, the more I type about this, the sadder I get. It kills me to watch them get old, and die....

The day Christine dies, I'll never be the same.

[Villavic]

Just wanted to share how Mick told in his book about the first days of Bob in the band.

...more important, we all got along well and decided that he was gonna be in the band. The auditions went on anyway for a while, but one night we went downstairs and started playing and that was it. It was unanimous. We loved his personality. His musical roots were in R&B instead of blues, and that was refreshing. We thought it would be an interesting blend. We knew he could sing; it was sort of talk-sing, with astute phrasing and timing. Plus he was well trained, as opposed to us who had just wandered into it. He was one of those guys who really sat down and played for hours and hours, an artistic chameleon who fit in with our colors and somehow inherited a bit of our history as well. To this day, I think personality is the most important thing in keeping a band together. I've seen too many impossible geniuses.

Once in the band, Bob really developed. He meshed well in every situation, and his songwriting and style became a big part of Fleetwood Mac in America. Which we badly needed, because without Peter Green ourcareer nosedived in Europe.

We also loved having an American in Fleetwood Mac. "They asked me to join and I said yeah," Bob Welch says. "I moved to Benifols, got an advance from Clifford Davies, which I used to buy a guitar. Immediately I began to discover Fleetwood Mac's unusual organisational methods. I was expecting they'd tell me to learn these songs and sing this way, but it was nothing like that. We just jammed for a long time, and played some blues on the side. I was waiting for them to tell me what kind of band they were, but instead I realized they expected me to be the band. I was expected to pull as much weight as anyone else. "

[Macfanforever]

Originally Posted by HomerMcvie

Indeed there are, and I will choose one of those methods, if I ever have to. (if I were terminally ill, and heading down the end of the journey, I'd do it, too)

I agree.But my sister,step father,bio-father dealt with that bloody word called cancer to the end.This is so sad about Bob.

[studyinscarlet]

I was terrified when one page had 'FM member commits suicide' and they had a pic of Lindsey for pete's sakes.

RIP Bob. Must have been a terribly heavy burden he was carrying.

[HomerMcvie]

Originally Posted by Macfanforever

I agree.But my sister,step father,bio-father dealt with that bloody word called cancer to the end.This is so sad about Bob.

We did Hospice at home, with my Mom. And it was fine, until the last two weeks. Then it was a nightmare. Even though she was 100 lbs, we couldn't help her move, without hurting her, and we weren't trained, obviously. Hospice was great, but they were only there once a day. We tried to get her into a nursing home, but there just wasn't time. The end came that quickly. But those last two weeks were sheer hell, for her and us.

After she died, my aunt's told their daughters that if it came to that for them, that they wanted to be put into a nursing home, for proper care, and also to not put them through the ordeal. But for me, I would choose suicide, too, when I knew the end was near.

**Sorry that we're speculating on Bob's reason. Just knowing that he'd been ill, and had surgery recently, made my mind first go to that conclusion...

[Villavic]

This is what Bob said about Mick's book (Q&A 2003 session)
I've read Mick's book, and I liked it. As far as I'm concerned , it's pretty accurate. Mick's whole life has been, and is, Fleetwood Mac. I don't think he can think of himself as separated from that. He and Fleetwood Mac are one and the same. This is very different from most bands, acting ensembles, etc. Imagine doing the same thing your whole life! As close as I've been to Fleetwood Mac, and as much as it defines my life...it's still not my WHOLE life. Mick is unique... Fleetwood Mac is unique. As they said in the 19th century ; "long live Fleetwood Mac" !

And this is what he said about his own book. It will never be finished. I wish it would be shared anyway to us...
The book's in about the same shape it was in '99 ; i.e., unfinished, with a couple of solid chapters and 800 loose pages. I'll maybe get back to it one of these days.

[Villavic]

Originally Posted by studyinscarlet

I was terrified when one page had 'FM member commits suicide' and they had a pic of Lindsey for pete's sakes.

How irresponsible is the press. Imagine if a Lindsey's relative see that.

[sharksfan2000]

I've always enjoyed this YouTube clip of Bob and the band performing "Bermuda Triangle". Love the way his glasses keep almost sliding all the way off his nose in this clip. Certainly no one else like him throughout the history of the band.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_KDdZRLqfcY

[bangdrum]

I just saw this.

Holy crap. SO SO SAD.

Mystery To Me is one of the greatest albums ever, and I own all of Bob's albums that are on CD (including the Paris albums).

RIP Bob!

[chiliD]

Originally Posted by sharksfan2000

I've always enjoyed this YouTube clip of Bob and the band performing "Bermuda Triangle". Love the way his glasses keep almost sliding all the way off his nose in this clip. Certainly no one else like him throughout the history of the band.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_KDdZRLqfcY

Damn, this is tough to watch today...I was in the audience during this taping...it was the VERY FIRST TIME seeing Fleetwood Mac in person...so the set they did for that show has always held a very special place in my heart...which has suddenly deepened to Mariana Trench depth with the events of today.

[michelej1]

Miami Herald, by Howard Cohen
Read more here: http://www.miamiherald.com/2012/06/0...#storylink=cpy

Former Fleetwood Mac guitarist/singer Bob Welch dead at 65

Beset by health issues, Bob Welch, whose departure from Fleetwood Mac preceded the group’s greatest success, apparently committed suicide in Nashville.

BY HOWARD COHEN
HCOHEN@MIAMIHERALD.COM
Bob Welch, whose mysterious and mystical Fleetwood Mac songs Bermuda Triangle, The Ghost and Hypnotized helped pave the way for his replacement, Stevie Nicks, and the group’s greatest success after his departure, has died at age 65 of a self-inflicted gunshot wound.

Welch’s body was found by his wife in their Nashville home Thursday afternoon, the Associated Press reported. He left a suicide note, and had been struggling with unspecified health issues.

His death seemed sadly foreshadowed by a lifetime of small victories and bitter disappointments. The singer/guitarist with the mellow voice and sophisticated air led Fleetwood Mac from 1971 until 1974 and, with Christine McVie, sang lead on most of the band’s material during that period.

His songs on albums like Bare Trees, Penguin and Mystery to Me, especially Sentimental Lady and the FM-radio classic, Hypnotized, helped establish Fleetwood Mac in the United States. Prior to joining the band as a replacement for iconic guitarist Peter Green, the group was known as a premier blues act in England in the late 1960s.

By 1969, Fleetwood Mac was outselling the Beatles and the Rolling Stones abroad with Green’s songsBlack Magic Woman (a hit later for Santana), Oh Well and the instrumental Albatross.

But in America Fleetwood Mac was largely unknown and its brand of authentic blues was not in tune with easy-listening pop acts like Elton John, the Carpenters and Carole King.

Welch’s sound — polished, radio-friendly yet moody and bewitching on songs like Sentimental Lady,Future Games and Emerald Eyes allowed the band to sell a steady 250,000 copies per album, good enough to keep the members signed and on the college touring circuit. More importantly, Welch helped Fleetwood Mac develop its distinctive male-female vocal blend that would prove formidable when Nicks and Lindsey Buckingham replaced him on New Year’s Eve 1975, after he quit.

In that respect, Welch joined Peter Best as rock’s unluckiest man. Best, of course, was the Beatles’ original drummer who toiled in obscurity with the pre-Fab Four before Ringo Starr’s arrival. Within a year of Welch’s departure, Fleetwood Mac hit No. 1 in America in 1976 with an eponymous album.

From that Fleetwood Mac LP, Nicks’ signature smash Rhiannon, which she always introduced on stage as “a song about a Welsh witch,” was a clear extension of Welch’s fascination with the otherworldly — UFOs, strange disappearances in the Bermuda Triangle off the coast of Key Biscayne and ghosts.

Nicks agreed to join Fleetwood Mac, she said, only after listening to Welch’s albums with the group and finding a common mystical thread that she could hear herself fitting into.

Fleetwood Mac’s next album, Rumours in 1977, went on to become one of the best-selling releases in history. At the same time, Welch had formed Paris, a heavy metal band. It went nowhere.

His fortunes rose, however, when Mick Fleetwood became his manager later that year and Welch enjoyed an initially popular solo career.

His first solo album, French Kiss in late 1977, featured a remake of his 1972 Fleetwood Mac songSentimental Lady, and it sailed into the Top 10. The more buoyant version was produced by Buckingham and also featured McVie and Fleetwood as guests. Welch also had Top 40 hits with √Ebony Eyes, Hot Love Cold World and the quasi-disco Precious Love through 1979.

Welch also continued his penchant for the bizarre by tapping into some South Florida lore. His second album in 1979, Three Hearts, featuredThe Ghost of Flight 401, an atmospheric tune about the aftermath of the Eastern Airlines flight that crashed in the Everglades in December 1972. Nicks lent her trademark wails to another song on the album that sounded like a Rumours outtake,Devil Wind.

“I had many great times with him after Lindsey and I joined Fleetwood Mac,” Nicks said in a statement to the Associated Press. “He was an amazing guitar player — he was funny, sweet — and he was smart. I am so very sorry for his family and for the family of Fleetwood Mac — so, so sad.”

Welch’s fame was short-lived. Subsequent albums didn’t sell, and he had a falling out with Fleetwood, later suing his old band mates for back royalties. Welch believes this was one reason for his omission from the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1997 when Fleetwood Mac members who were in the band before and after him were inducted.

“The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame thing hurt my feelings, naturally,” Welch said in a 1999 online interview. “Mick (and John McVie and Chris) associate Peter Green with the high flying glory days of their youth, when FM was first breaking out in Europe. They associate Stevie and Lindsey, naturally enough, with the most glamorous, successful and exciting period in FM’s history. They associate my five years with the band, in contrast, with a very difficult time emotionally, which it was. Even though the band survived because of what we went through in that period, it’s not pleasant to think about for them, and so theydon’t think about it and pretend it doesn’t exist.”

Yet Welch would never escape the connection. His final album, recorded in 2006, was titled His Fleetwood Mac Years and Beyond Too. The set featured re-recordings of songs he originally recorded with the band — and, ever out-there in the misty world of the supernatural, a cover of Nicks’ Rhiannon.

[SteveMacD]

I was a newborn when they did that! But I vividly remember the day I got the video in 1991. I was 16, and it was better than watching a porno (that's when I knew I had the rock bug, which I still have today). That video had the Peter Green German TV show from 1985, Man Of The World music video, Kirshner show, Midnight Special (Rhiannon, Why, and Over My Head), and SYLM from Rosebud. I got it from a guy named Brian E. Norris from Cleveland (nice chap).

The Kirshner show did, and still does, top everything on that video, and it was all because of Bob. My uncle thought Fleetwood Mac sucked until he saw "Manalishi," and then he got it. Peter was too sad, BuckyNicksMac was a bit too polished (though great), but the Welch stuff was amazing. It was weird, it rocked...Great stuff. I totally envy SteveD for getting to go.

[sodascouts]

Just heard about this and came straight here. What a tragedy. My heart goes out to his family. RIP, Bob.

[SteveMacD]

The Bobs.