Entertainment Weekly celebrates the 40th anniversary of Rumours

[jbrownsjr]

Originally Posted by Macfan4life

"Listen to the whole last quarter of “Don’t Stop.” At precisely the time when 99 percent of the drummers, dead or alive, would be trying to throw some variety, rolls, or time-tricky energy-boosting into the piece, Mick Fleetwood remains unwaveringly loyal and constant to the nearly motorik-like metronomic high hat/snare beat he has played through the entire song. Aside from Tommy Ramone, Klaus Dinger, or the aforementioned Graham, I don’t know of any other drummer who would have made this choice".

THANK YOU TIM SOMMER
FINALLY some love for Don't Stop

I remember Mick saying how prior to the SN/LB era the shuffle Christine played could have been on one of their earlier albums. Mick and Christine rock it and of course Lindsey adds good chops with vocals and some great guitar.

I love Don't Stop. After I saw Christine come back and add her magic back to the Mac... I really appreciated it even more.

[FuzzyPlum]

Originally Posted by SisterNightroad

How Fleetwood Mac’s ‘Rumours’ Became One of the Best Albums Ever

Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours, this intense, intimate, engaging miracle that we often take for granted, turns 40 this week.

It’s important that we separate this stellar achievement from the ludicrous time in which it was made.

Those of us old enough to remember the 1970s—or rather, when the mid-ish 1970s became the late-ish 1970s, that un-shining time when the freakish, frantic optimism of the Bicentennial cracked into the blackouts and Bowery-trash fires of 1977—may be too quick to file away Rumours with the other gargantuan leviathans of the Jimmy Carter/Ohmygod-Cheap Trick-is-on Midnight Special-era, i.e., do we just throw it all in a bin with the first Boston album, Meatloaf’s Bat out of Hell, Frampton Comes Alive, or Hotel California, and be done with it?
But Rumours isn’t having any of that. It is far better than that.

Rumours may have a place in our 1970s experience, but the 1970s experience doesn’t tell us anything about Rumours.

Rumours is virtually nothing like any contemporary record, either mainstream or alternative.

How strange is that?

Rumours was Fleetwood Mac’s 11th studio album, released nearly a decade after Fleetwood Mac’s debut. How many bands attain that rare spot in the sweet and rapturous air of multi-platinum, record-breaking commercial Arcadia—much less achieve artistic transcendence!—on their 11th album? My God, it was their 11th studio album. Their fifth, sixth, seventh, and eighth albums hadn’t even charted in the U.K. Only two and a half years prior to its release, the group had been considered so commercially invisible that their manager attempted to send imposters on the road in their place.

Yet Rumours is not only the ninth-best-selling album of all time, it is an adamantine artistic accomplishment that deserves to be mentioned when we discuss The Greatest Albums Of All Time—and it merits being removed from all the silly cultural confetti usually thrown in its direction, and should be examined with great, loving detail.[i]

Rumours is an old, sweet and complicated friend who gets more interesting every time you talk to them. Even when they tell you a story you have heard 88 times, you find some new details, some new angle, some new twist or emphasis you never noticed before.

But first, a few words about the fascinating story of Fleetwood Mac, and the road that led them to Rumours.

Circa 1974 there was no reason to think Fleetwood Mac’s commercial future would be any brighter than that of Savoy Brown, Renaissance, or Fairport Convention (to name three other credible and well-liked acts of English origin who could play medium and small/medium-sized venues in the States and place themselves on the mid-lower rungs of the U.S. charts). More confusingly, by 1974, the Mac had shuffled through a startling array of lineup changes and musical styles.

Between their formation in 1967 and 1970, Fleetwood Mac were an ass-tearing, incendiary blues and boogie band who pioneered some proto-metal tricks (they also had a penchant for both the ridiculous and, occasionally, the elegiac). A listener who was hearing early Mac for the first time might, not entirely inaccurately, lump them in with Gary Clark Jr., Stevie Ray Vaughan, or Cream.[ii]

For the sake of understanding where Rumours came from, our story really begins in 1970, when Danny Kirwan—originally a second guitarist and third vocalist—emerged as a co-leader of the band. Kirwan introduced an element of near-pastoral folk-pop into the mix, transforming Mac’s boogie churn into a platform for gentle and intense excursions into a sad blue pop.

Shortly thereafter, Christine Perfect, a buttermilk alto vocalist of almost aching sensitivity (and a keyboardist of great skill) joined the band, further supporting the transition of the “blues” Mac into a band with folk-pop and art-folk overtones (I covered some of this in a piece I wrote for the Observer in November of 2015 on Danny Kirwan; please pour yourself a Clamato and vodka and read it).[iii]

The initial foreshadowing of Mac’s mid-‘70s mega success can be found on the two Kirwan/Christine McVie-dominated Mac albums, Future Games (1971) and 1972’s Bare Trees.[iv] The difficult and fascinating Kirwan left Mac in late 1972.

American guitarist and vocalist Bob Welch joined the Mac in time for Future Games, and it’s easy—too easy—to identify this as an integral factor in the road to Rumours; I think this is a false flag. Some might say that gummy, tobacco-stained pop songs like “Sentimental Lady” (from 1972’s Bare Trees) preview Mac’s mega-gold future, but I think Welch’s sly, winking, pallid attempts at California snarl and FM bong-blues are an outlier in the Mac story. It is, in fact, Christine McVie’s simplicity and melodicism and the elegant sorrow of Danny Kirwan that anticipates Mac’s future as a gentle yet persuasive bittersweet macramé-and-satin pop machine.[v]

The first Fleetwood Mac album unquestionably recognizable as a “modern” Mac album is 1974’s Heroes Are Hard to Find. This is largely thanks to Christine McVie, whose material combines British post-folk wistfulness with an easily graspable rhythmic and chordal structure that recalls All Things Must Pass-era George Harrison.

McVie’s alluring and affecting contributions to Heroes show that the Rumours-era Mac was already fairly well articulated before Lindsey Buckingham and Stevie Nicks even joined the band, and I don’t think she gets enough credit for this. The idea that Mac would be a band that mixed the simple, the soaring, the aching and the accomplished is very largely the gift of Christine McVie, and we see hints of this as early as 1970s Christine Perfect album.

Lindsey Buckingham and Stevie Nicks joined Fleetwood Mac at the very end of 1974, and their first album with the band, 1975’s Fleetwood Mac, reached No. 1 (to date, the best performing Mac album in America had been Heroes, which reached No. 34).

I think it’s fair to say that Fleetwood Mac is clearly a beta version of Rumours. Rather dramatically, within the first second of Fleetwood Mac, we meet the clipped, hiccuping hyper pop of Lindsey Buckingham. Buckingham sounds like he’s Andy Partridge writing songs for the Cowsills, or maybe like some holy cross between David Byrne and Harry Nilsson; his opening salvo on Fleetwood Mac sounds almost alien, connected to a new wave future or to the sunny bubblegum of the Rubinoos or Paul Collins (though with that constant, peculiar overlay of an almost Orbison-esque Americana). Even over 41 years later, it still startles.

Although I find Buckingham’s songwriting contributions to Fleetwood Mac thin, his style, his presence, his aggressive and precisely syncopated guitar playing, and his simple but scientific leads are always nearby and pointing clearly to the (near) future.[vi]

And then there’s “Rhiannon.”

On track four of Fleetwood Mac, honey and opium have been poured over the future of the band in the form of this utterly compelling black light and Eve cigarette cat’s heartbeat of a song. In fact, the song itself had been dosed in opium and over-sweetened chamomile tea, since in its original form (performed live, but never recorded, by Buckingham and Nicks), “Rhiannon” was nearly twice the speed, had an almost Southern rock-ish twist, and Nicks’ seductive purr is replaced by an almost Joplin-esque howl.

This transition is very important to note, since it provides a clue about the core genius of the Fleetwood Mac/Rumours-era band: there is something about Fleetwood Mac (whether it’s the grace and glow of McVie, or the Bullet Train-clean pulse of Mick Fleetwood and John McVie) that ropes and wrangles “Rhiannon,” and makes it dreamlike and nearly perfect.

Finally, we arrive at Rumours, released a year and a half after Fleetwood Mac.

One of the defining aspects of Rumours is claustrophobia. Sonic claustrophobia, that is. This, I believe, provides the context for all of its achievements.

The sounds on Rumours are tight, closeted, and largely lacking in ambience. This is virtually unique for a California-based mega-pop band of the 1970s (though more common to the punk records being made at this time in the U.K.).

Ambience—meaning, literal ambience, as in reverb, presence, and the listener’s awareness of the size of the room a band is performing in—is a vastly underrated and important quality. Ambience telegraphs a great deal to the listener about how they are involved in the experience. By creating this masterpiece of virtual non-ambience, on Rumours Fleetwood Mac makes the epic (those amazing arrangements, those amazing songs, those amazing performances) intimate and personal. It’s a very tough trick.

Each and every listener, even if they are listening to the album in a social setting or in a crowd, hears it as if it was a story being told just to them. Because of this, Rumours feels almost like a condensed epic, arranged within an inch of its life but never losing the small-electric ensemble feel.

This intimate ambience also provides a fascinating environment for Buckingham’s intensely orchestrated guitar parts, which are tucked so neatly into the mix that they do not display their feathers, except upon intense examination; discovering the depth and detail of Buckingham’s guitar work on Rumours is like an Easter Egg, or like taking out a magnifying glass and finding the Lord’s Prayer written on the side of a popsicle stick.

If this tight, intimate ambience provides the context for Rumours, Mick Fleetwood and John McVie provide the framework. I cannot stress this enough: For all the praise we can heap on Lindsey Buckingham and the shiny apples he puts in front of the listener, for all the admiration I can express for the warm, expressive genius of Christine McVie, for all the appreciation I have for Stevie Nicks’ sexy, horny voice and the lacy, blowsy cult that sprung up around her, I think that Fleetwood and John McVie are the reason Rumours is Rumours.

Taut, powerful, and utterly devoid of one single bar where they insist on the spotlight, Mick Fleetwood and John McVie’s performance on Rumours is, well, nearly perfect. Because Fleetwood largely eschews crash cymbals, often keeps the four beat on a tom, and plays a tightly screwed hi-hat, his drumming is often nearly invisible; but that just means he’s doing something very, very right. I can think of no English drummer, with the possible exception of session king Bobby Graham, who played with such a mixture of economy and power.[vii]

Bassist McVie, although certainly conscious of the chord changes, plays Fleetwood more than he plays Fleetwood Mac; which is to say he echoes, almost seamlessly, the steady, fat, flat kick drum, crisp snare, and heartbeat toms of Fleetwood’s playing. He underplays the chord changes, and plays exactly with and on top of Fleetwood. The rhythm section’s approach leaves a phenomenal amount of room for the guitars and the vocals to expand, emote, hum, harmonize, twinkle, and chug. Honestly, I think Fleetwood and John McVie’s performance on Rumours is one of the great album-length rhythm section performances in rock history, yet it never draws attention to itself.

Listen to the whole last quarter of “Don’t Stop.” At precisely the time when 99 percent of the drummers, dead or alive, would be trying to throw some variety, rolls, or time-tricky energy-boosting into the piece, Mick Fleetwood remains unwaveringly loyal and constant to the nearly motorik-like metronomic high hat/snare beat he has played through the entire song. Aside from Tommy Ramone, Klaus Dinger, or the aforementioned Graham, I don’t know of any other drummer who would have made this choice.

There is something about Lindsey Buckingham’s accomplishments on Rumours that defies easy description. Where does this gift come from, this ability to spin Harry Nilsson/Brian Wilson-level melody over “Farmer John” chords with Becker/Fagen precision (yet without ever dipping into Steely Dan’s jazzy pastel Capezios)? It’s virtually unique, almost as if Jeff Lynne was producing the Monkees, or Mutt Lange was producing the Association, or Phil Ramone was producing Captain Sensible (hey, that’s a good idea).

Who else, other than gorgeous oddities like Jason Faulkner, R. Stevie Moore or Sean O’Hagan, devote this much attention to getting the most sugary pop so very, very right, and then do it again and again?

As for Christine McVie, the captivating post-folk/pre-Kate Bush melodic melancholy of her presence (often, her blue, sugary woe reminds me of Nick Drake channeled by Hope Sandoval) provides the gorgeous lilting night-light to Buckingham’s proud, rumbling sun.

As for Stevie, well, she’s Stevie, ‘nuff said, and I am very fond of Stevie Nicks, but oddly, I would contend that she’s the most dispensable element to Rumours’ genius. She exists as a public face for this extremely well-tuned machine, but the gears function fine without her. Actually, I’m not sure Rumours contains a Stevie song half as good as “Rhiannon” or her extraordinary “Beautiful Child” on Tusk.

Rumours was a single, shining moment. With Tusk, the extraordinary ensemble playing that had kept Rumours centered and consistent flies off the rails, and that’s probably the reason that the best moments on Tusk belong to Nicks and Christine McVie, because unlike Buckingham, they are still thinking and acting like band members.[viii]

Buckingham’s work on Tusk is damn good (“I Know I’m Not Wrong” is pretty much as good as anything he wrote for Rumours), but it doesn’t sound like Fleetwood Mac. It sounds like Lindsey Buckingham. There is nothing on Rumours, not one bar, that doesn’t sound like Fleetwood effing Mac.[ix]

Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours is a gift that keeps on giving. What was a generational touchstone has become, with time, a masterpiece worthy of detailed analysis; it is as joyful when heard in 21st-century headphones as it was when it was played on an over-heated stereo at some hazy high school party. It has grown with us, and will no doubt continue to do so.

[i] Confession: I adore Rumours, but it isn’t even my favorite Fleetwood Mac album. I prefer both Tusk and Bare Trees, and if I am going to take off my weighty thinking cap and just throw my head back and shimmy and scream a little bit—not a pretty sight—I would rather listen to the live albums Mac recorded at the Boston Tea Party in 1970.

[ii] The founder and original leader of Fleetwood Mac, guitarist and vocalist Peter Green, somewhat perversely named the band not after himself, but after his rhythm section, drummer Mick Fleetwood and bassist John McVie.

[iii] Perfect, who issued one exquisite must-have solo album in 1970, would be known as Christine McVie when she joined Fleetwood Mac.

[iv] This isn’t entirely true—there’s some hints in the Kirwan-penned material on 1970’s Kiln House—but how bloody complicated do you want me to make this?

[v] Having said all that, here are four fairly important things to note about Bob Welch: First, he introduces the idea that Mac could survive as a one-guitar band, a concept that would have been unthinkable just two years earlier, when the band had three guitarists; second, he compels the group to move to California, and that’s huge; thirdly, his departure in late 1974 paves the way for history; and finally, considering all the extraordinary and damaged characters who have been in Fleetwood Mac (the band has had 16 full and active members) it is an interesting statistical improbability that only three of them—Bob Welch, Bob Brunning, and Bob Weston—have died.

[vi] 1975’s Fleetwood Mac is actually the second Mac studio album to be eponymously titled; the band’s spitting, gray, Chicago-via-Soho debut, released in 1967, is also titled Fleetwood Mac.

[vii] If for some bizarre reason Mick Fleetwood is reading this, I would love to ask him if the vastly important and under-heralded Bobby Graham influenced him.

[viii] In my opinion, the second-best song in Fleetwood Mac’s entire catalog is Christine McVie’s shimmering, ghostly “Never Makes Me Cry” from Tusk. The first, if you were wondering, is “Albatross,” the heavenly instrumental from 1968, which is one of the greatest recordings ever made.

[ix] Buckingham’s solo work in the 1980s is so swallowed up with the desire to be seen as the precocious child in the classroom (a quality evident throughout Tusk, though nowhere on Rumours) as to be almost universally unlistenable. His ’80s solo catalog is replete with quirks and studio giggles that must have seemed smart at the time, but probably sounded dated, distracting, and useless by the time Buckingham got into the parking lot. This stuff is a prime example of what I have always referred to a SMPTE Code Syndrome—when someone becomes so utterly fascinated by all the little noises that the mixing board can make that they completely lose track of what those noises are contributing to the songs. But there is none of that on Rumours, not one iota.



http://observer.com/2017/02/fleetwoo...ersary-review/

What an astonishingly good article. I certainly don't agree with absolutely everything this chap writes but most of it is spot on. I never thought of the 'All Things Must Pass' comparison before but I do kind of get it.

[bombaysaffires]

Best bits of this article for me:


For the sake of understanding where Rumours came from, our story really begins in 1970, when Danny Kirwan—originally a second guitarist and third vocalist—emerged as a co-leader of the band. Kirwan introduced an element of near-pastoral folk-pop into the mix, transforming Mac’s boogie churn into a platform for gentle and intense excursions into a sad blue pop.


This intimate ambience also provides a fascinating environment for Buckingham’s intensely orchestrated guitar parts, which are tucked so neatly into the mix that they do not display their feathers, except upon intense examination; discovering the depth and detail of Buckingham’s guitar work on Rumours is like an Easter Egg, or like taking out a magnifying glass and finding the Lord’s Prayer written on the side of a popsicle stick.

If this tight, intimate ambience provides the context for Rumours, Mick Fleetwood and John McVie provide the framework. I cannot stress this enough: For all the praise we can heap on Lindsey Buckingham and the shiny apples he puts in front of the listener, for all the admiration I can express for the warm, expressive genius of Christine McVie, for all the appreciation I have for Stevie Nicks’ sexy, horny voice and the lacy, blowsy cult that sprung up around her, I think that Fleetwood and John McVie are the reason Rumours is Rumours.
Honestly, I think Fleetwood and John McVie’s performance on Rumours is one of the great album-length rhythm section performances in rock history, yet it never draws attention to itself.

As for Stevie. She exists as a public face for this extremely well-tuned machine, but the gears function fine without her.

Rumours was a single, shining moment. With Tusk, the extraordinary ensemble playing that had kept Rumours centered and consistent flies off the rails, and that’s probably the reason that the best moments on Tusk belong to Nicks and Christine McVie, because unlike Buckingham, they are still thinking and acting like band members.[viii]

Buckingham’s work on Tusk is damn good (“I Know I’m Not Wrong” is pretty much as good as anything he wrote for Rumours), but it doesn’t sound like Fleetwood Mac. It sounds like Lindsey Buckingham. There is nothing on Rumours, not one bar, that doesn’t sound like Fleetwood effing Mac.

Buckingham’s solo work in the 1980s is so swallowed up with the desire to be seen as the precocious child in the classroom (a quality evident throughout Tusk, though nowhere on Rumours) as to be almost universally unlistenable. His ’80s solo catalog is replete with quirks and studio giggles that must have seemed smart at the time, but probably sounded dated, distracting, and useless by the time Buckingham got into the parking lot. This stuff is a prime example of what I have always referred to a SMPTE Code Syndrome—when someone becomes so utterly fascinated by all the little noises that the mixing board can make that they completely lose track of what those noises are contributing to the songs. But there is none of that on Rumours, not one iota.



http://observer.com/2017/02/fleetwoo...ersary-review/[/QUOTE]

With the exception that I don't find all of LB's 80s work "universally unlistenable"

[SisterNightroad]

"Don't Stop" Celebrating the 40th Anniversary of Fleetwood Mac's "Rumours"

February 4 marks the 40th anniversary of the release of one of the most beloved, not to mention best-selling, albums of all time: Fleetwood Mac's Rumours. While the making of the album was full of drama due to drugs and band in-fighting, Stevie Nicks still looks back on the experience as "fantastic."

While recording Rumours, newly divorced keyboardist Christine McVie and bass player John McVie were on the outs, and Lindsey Buckingham and Stevie Nicks also were breaking up. In addition, drummer Mick Fleetwood had learned his wife had an affair. But Stevie says they seemed to thrive on the turmoil.

"We were all writing little movies around what was really happening, and we were digging it," she tells ABC Radio. "We were having a lot of fun recording those songs, even though we were falling apart...if anything was keeping us from falling apart, it was going into the studio everyday. And we were totally having a great time."

Rumours co-producer Ken Caillat tells ABC Radio how the band "started throwing champagne in each other's faces and yelling at each other," and that fights broke out in response to the song lyrics, which they all wrote about each other. Stevie, though, insists everything was terrific.

"It was not awful at all, it was fantastic!" she gushes. "We were rich, we were young, we were falling out of love with each other, but, hey... there was a lot of other men and women in the world, and we were all moving on...So as bad as it was, it was still great."

Rumours topped the Billboard album chart and won the Grammy for Album of the Year. It's sold more than 45 million copies worldwide. It featured the hits "Go Your Own Way," "Dreams," "Don't Stop" and "You Make Loving Fun."

Copyright © 2017, ABC Radio. All rights reserved.



http://abcnewsradioonline.com/music-...wood-macs.html

[SisterNightroad]

Don’t Stop: Fleetwood Mac’s Grammy-Winning ‘Rumours,’ 40 Years On

It was the album of a generation — a bestseller boasting hits galore and a backstory that would rival Dynasty and Dallas and the other TV soaps soon to emerge.

It was made by a colorful, attractive band whose first Rolling Stone cover depicted all five band members in bed together.

The year was 1977, the band was Fleetwood Mac, and the album was Rumours.

Incredibly, it turns 40 this week, on Feb. 4.

To say that Rumours changed popular culture would not be an exaggeration. It was the album that lifted what had been a successful, long-lived, onetime British blues band into the sales stratosphere; that launched the unforgettable image of the bejeweled, twirling, scarf-bedecked, deliberately mystical singer Stevie Nicks; that was filled with catchy but often deeply personal songs about disintegrating relationships — and, not incidentally, a polished piece of pop perfection that sounds equally inspirational four decades on.

A significant amount of drugs were involved in its making.

But then, that was the ‘70s, wasn’t it?

Founded in 1967 in London by legendary blues guitarist Peter Green, Fleetwood Mac played wonderful music but changed band members with alarming regularity. By the time Rumours had come to be, gone were great slate of players including guitarists Green, Jeremy Spencer, Danny Kirwan, and America’s own Bob Welch — and in were the colorful pair of Nicks and onetime romantic partner Lindsey Buckingham. They’d joined the band in 1975, and with remaining Mac members Mick Fleetwood and then-married couple John and Christine McVie, recorded an eponymous album that — unexpectedly for all concerned — hit No. 1 and would go on to sell more than 5 million copies.

Then things really got weird.

With the last album’s success of the Christine McVie-penned “Over My Head” and “Say You Love Me” and Stevie Nicks’s own, culturally myth-making “Rhiannon,” recording a follow-up might have been a breeze. But it absolutely was not. Not helping? The decaying personal relationships of literally every band member. The McVies had split and were barely communicating; Buckingham and Nicks were a couple no more; and drummer Fleetwood himself was facing an on-again/off-again relationship with wife Jenny Boyd, which finally ended in 1978.

And about the drug thing: “Those days were crazy,” drummer Fleetwood would later tell writer Craig Rosen in his book The Billboard Book of Number One Albums (Billboard Books, 1996). “It’s no secret that we were definitely abusing drugs in those days. It was one major lunatic party.”

Finally, there was an almost freakishly obsessive drive to record a sonically perfect follow-up. The band first moved en masse to Sausalito, spent nine weeks recording material they ultimately found unsatisfactory, stopped to tour a bit while Fleetwood Mac reached Billboard’s No. 1 slot, then watched in horror as their intended master tapes for the new album started wearing thin due to multiple overdubbing.

But when it was done, it was done, and Rumours — as it was called, at John McVie’s suggestion — was first announced by the December 1976 arrival of lead-up single “Go Your Own Way,” a top 10 hit with a telling title and lyric that well represented the coming album’s emotionally turbulent themes.

And then: BOOM!

Rumours soared to No. 1, knocking off no less than the Eagles’ Hotel California, and with its surplus of new hits including “Dreams,” “Don’t Stop,” and “You Making Loving Fun,” stayed there for 31 weeks. It would later win the 1977 Grammy for Album of the Year, sell more than 45 million copies worldwide, and in 2014 receive the extremely rare diamond (translation = even better than gold or platinum) certification from the RIAA for U.S. sales of over 20 million. And that was three years ago.

But back then, success — and excess–was taking its toll. There was rough emotional going, and while other albums by this diamond-version Mac would follow — the rewarding and experimental Tusk, a live set, the mildly disappointing Mirage, and the extraordinary (and soon to be re-released in a deluxe version) Tango in the Night — Lindsey Buckingham would then depart, and things were never quite the same again.

Sort of.

While there was an unexpected respite in 1993, when the full band memorably reunited for President Bill Clinton’s inauguration ball and gave “Don’t Stop” — Clinton’s chosen campaign song — an unexpected re-performance, solo albums by nearly every Mac member was the norm for most of the ‘90s.

Fast forward to May 22, 1997, and guess who’s back? Live on a Burbank soundstage, celebrating the 20th anniversary of Rumours, it’s the newly reunited Fleetwood Mac: Buckingham, Nicks, Fleetwood, and the McVies. If making that album had been a case study of study of the impact of excess on business efficiency, time has changed much: From this reunion performance would come an MTV special, a separate VH1 special, a live album (The Dance), and eventually a home video release. And it all served as a preview for an upcoming live tour. Fleetwood Mac: They’re back!

It is still May 1997, a bit later, and I am sitting in a small waiting room in Conway Studios in Hollywood. In one of those uniquely journalistic scenarios, while I sit in the room, recorder and notes nearby, each of the members of Fleetwood Mac is brought in for questioning. Surreal? You bet.

Lindsey Buckingham is discussing his original reason for departing the band back in 1987. “It really was a survival move, emotionally and physically,” he says. “It was just the atmosphere was not very conducive to being creative. A lot of the people had personal problems. It was just in order to regroup — and get back on a track where I felt I was really grounded in the process again, and was sort of, in theory, doing it for the right reasons again.”

Rumours and all that it entailed did much for popular culture, but it’s a good bet it did even more for — and to — the five members of Fleetwood Mac who were a part of it.

Buckingham says the time away from the band has done him very well indeed. “I’ve settled down a lot emotionally, and a lot of that comes from just having been away,” he says. “Really, you break up with Stevie in ‘77, and then you work with her for the next 10 years. I mean, it’s just not normal. It’s just not the way it’s done.” He laughs.

“And you would think, ‘Well, 10 years, get over it, buddy,’ but certain things just did not get resolved until I removed myself from the situation. So there’s that, there’s the fact that everyone’s habits are little bit different now. I mean, Stevie especially — she’s like very reminiscent of the person I used to live with, the person I fell in love with. There’s a sweetness that was totally absent, or blank, before.”

Later, and separately, Stevie Nicks is sitting down, exuding warmth, candor, and the sort of difficult-to-pinpoint personal appeal that made her an entire generation’s most-favorite-ever Welsh Witch.

Did she ever wish things in Fleetwood Mac, back in those days, had gone down differently?

“Oh, it could never have been any different than it was,” she says with absolute conviction. “You know, Lindsey and I didn’t even drink when we joined Fleetwood. We couldn’t afford to drink. So we started drinking like anybody else starts drinking — just to handle the mental pressure. We were really young, you know? Twenty-seven years old, really, really young, and this was all so big and so heavy around us, and people expected so much from us. And all of a sudden we went from barely having enough money to pay for a small apartment to being rich overnight — and how do you deal with that when you’re 27 years old?

“You kind of don’t deal with it very well. And nobody dealt with it very well.

“But all of those problems, and all of those drugs, and all of the fun and all of the craziness, all made for writing all those songs. If we’d been a big healthy great group of guys and gals that just were, you know…” She looks for a word that conveys regular or ordinary. “…then none of those great songs would’ve been written, you know?”

Reconfirming that point of view with warmth, charm, and noticeably excessive height, lanky drummer Mick Fleetwood takes his seat at Conway and discusses the mythology of the Mac, of that Rumours time and all that came with it. And even later.

“No matter how many horrors stories people were told,” he says, “and how many horror stories we told, I think you’ll find when you speak with everyone — the reality is that we never lost, there’s a real underlying love, a true love that is fairly unique, in this band, in my opinion. We’ve all done terrible things to one another, just as lovers do. And now, we truly look at that and go, there’s business involved, but this is not business.”

It was an interesting time back then in 1997, for Fleetwood Mac and how Rumours was then perceived. Don’t forget, it came at the height of punk rock’s popular emergence, and in some ways the band and all they represented — dollars, lifestyle, conspicuous consumption — was the antithesis of all then deemed cool. But not for long. Conspicuous era hipsters like Billy Corgan and Courtney Love were singing Fleetwood Mac’s praises back then. Corgan’s Smashing Pumpkins would go on to cover “Landslide,” and Love herself took on “Gold Dust Woman” and “Silver Springs.”

Buckingham mentions it when we speak of the timeliness of the Mac’s 1997 reunion. “You’ve got this whole younger group of people whose parents used to come see shows,” he says. “And they know the Fleetwood Mac music on record, and maybe because people like Courtney and Smashing Pumpkins have sort of been vocal about saying, ‘Hey, Fleetwood Mac is, whatever, not the enemy anymore — or whatever you want to say about that. The timing of that is great.”

And while the music of Corgan and Love continues to fall in and out fashion, in 2017 the 40-year-old Rumours sounds as fresh and inspiring as ever. These days, music reviewers refer to it when they want to describe a new musical work reflecting deep personal turmoil, frazzled relationships, even gleeful excess, etc. And its impact has only grown with time. As of today, “Go Your Own Way” has been played 110,903,863 times on Spotify — and I reckon that it will continue to be listened to long after that streaming music service ends its run.

Of all people, it might be Nicks who nails what it is that makes Rumours so special.

She is recounting what it felt like to perform that material again — with Fleetwood Mac, in front of that live audience. The reception could not have been more enthusiastic, I tell her.

“It makes you feel a little bit like you’re having a kind of a holy experience,” she says, a bit of the mystic apparently hitting her. “Like we’re all going back to how we were when we heard ‘Gold Dust Woman’ on the radio — when we were driving down the street with the top down on the car, we’re all back there, and the ‘silver spoon’ and ‘dig your grave’ lyrics, and ‘Don’t Stop.’

“It’s like, when I think of those songs, I remember where I was and what I was doing when I was hearing them. And I can see it in people’s faces. I can see… it’s like all of us get to go back. For a little while in time, we get to escape back there.”



https://www.yahoo.com/music/dont-sto...234954265.html

[SisterNightroad]

Fleetwood Mac’s ‘Rumours’ – A Timeless Classic Turns 40
Their greatest album never seems to get old.



“No matter where I am in the world, and I don’t know why it is, I keep hearing Fleetwood Mac tracks.” This is a quote from U2 bassist Adam Clayton in a recent Rolling Stone interview. “Why is it those songs have got such big, strong legs?”

While Fleetwood Mac has had a great career with a bevy of hit albums, let’s say that at least 50% of the time when Clayton — or anyone else — hears a Fleetwood Mac song, it’s from 1977’s Rumours, which turns 40 this weekend (February 4). It’s an album that has sold over 45 million copies worldwide, so it has strong legs, indeed.

Their prior album, 1975’s Fleetwood Mac (also known as “The White Album”) marked a new beginning for the band. It was their tenth album, but the first with new members Lindsey Buckingham (a singer/songwriter/guitarist) and Stevie Nicks (a singer/songwriter), who joined long-time singer/songwriter/keyboardist Christine McVie, and founding members Mick Fleetwood (drums) and John McVie (bass).

Fleetwood Mac was a great album: it had “Rhiannon,” “Over My Head,” “Say You Love Me” and “Landslide.” It put the one-time blues rock band on the map as a major pop act, and has gone on to sell over five million copies.

But Rumours took Fleetwood Mac to a whole other level: it topped the Billboard album charts, spawning an onslaught of hits including “Dreams,” “Don’t Stop,” “Go Your Own Way,” “The Chain,” “You Make Loving Fun” and “Gold Dust Woman.” It has sold over 45 million copies.

How great was Rumours? So great that one of Nicks’ finest songs, “Silver Springs,” didn’t make the cut. It was first released as the b-side to “Go Your Own Way,” and the band later recorded it for their 1997 live reunion album The Dance, and today is considered a classic among fans.

As most pop culture fans know, Rumours chronicles the end of several relationships within the band. Buckingham and Nicks, who joined as a couple and as a duo (they’d recorded their debut album as Buckingham/Nicks before entering the Fleetwood Mac fray) were breaking up. Fleetwood was going through a divorce (and would eventually have an affair with Nicks) and the McVies were splitting up as well. Christine was starting a new relationship… with the band’s lighting director.

In the liner notes of Rhino Records’ excellent 2013 reissue of the album, Buckingham says, “I really think there came a time when the sales of Rumours became less about the music and started being more about the phenomenon and the musical soap opera of it all. Something about it really tapped into the voyeur in everyone — including us. And it was voyeuristic in the best way possible; not in a tabloid or exploitative way, but on a more honest and real level.”

Decades later, there are surely those who enjoy listening to these songs and knowing the context in which they were written, as Buckingham notes. But it’s safe to say that the songs have not only transcended their era, but also the drama that spawned them. Listening to Nicks’ “Dreams” today, it’s clear that it’s a breakup song, but it could be about your breakup. “Now here you go again, you say you want your freedom/Well, who am I to keep you down?” Same with Buckingham’s “Go Your Own Way”: “Tell me why everything turned around.” Who hasn’t felt that about a relationship as it’s going south? On the other hand, Christine McVie’s “You Make Loving Fun” reads as an enthused ode to a new relationship: “You make loving fun, and I don’t have to tell you that you’re the only one.” To a younger audience, it may not matter that she still shares a last name with the guy plunking the amazing bassline on the song.

“Don’t Stop,” famously used as Bill Clinton’s campaign song, is another Christine McVie composition. “If you wake up and don’t want to smile, if it takes just a little while/Open your eyes and look at the day, you’ll see things in a different way.” Is that a trite way to say “goodbye” to an ex-? Maybe, but there’s sweetness and compassion there too. And, clearly, what Clinton’s team gravitated towards is the song’s optimistic message, rather than the circumstances that spawned it: “Don’t stop thinking about tomorrow/Don’t stop, it’ll soon be here/It’ll be better than before/Yesterday’s gone, yesterday’s gone.” The song was so vaguely written that it could work for anyone: any number of candidates or campaigns could’ve used “Don’t Stop.”

And therein may lay part of the album’s enduring popularity. Sonically, it doesn’t sound especially attached to any era, but more than that, the lyrics — whether you know the context or not — have a universal appeal. It’s not just about breaking up, it’s about breaking up and still being able to look at each other. In a country where so many divorcees have children and still need to be able to communicate with some level of civility, that resonates.

It also resonates because we’re in an era the country seems to be coming apart at the seams. As estranged as protestors may feel from Trump supporters, and vice-versa, it feels like the country is as divided as it has ever been. You may be angry at someone who voted differently than you, but you’re probably even angrier at someone who broke your heart and left you. Perhaps, there’s something to be learned from Fleetwood Mac.

Despite their history, Fleetwood Mac always come together every few years to remind us how great they are together. It’s not always neat; after 1987’s Tango in the Night, Lindsay Buckingham left the band, leaving Nicks, Fleetwood and the McVies to replace him with two guitarist-singers for a tour and a (forgettable) album, Behind the Mask. Of course, the five came together for 1997’s The Dance, but Christine McVie once again left the band the following year. Nicks, Buckingham, Fleetwood and John McVie trudged on with 2003’s double album Say You Will and 2013’s Extended Play EP, before McVie once again rejoined in 2014 for a tour.

While there’s been talk of a new Fleetwood Mac album for a while, Stevie Nicks has spent a lot of time on the road lately doing solo tours. So the latest development in the band’s drama is an upcoming Lindsey Buckingham/Christine McVie duets album, featuring the rhythm section of Mick Fleetwood and John McVie. If this album ever sees the light of day, it will, in all but name, be a Nicks-less Fleetwood Mac album.

Fleetwood Mac fans have been through this before; at this point, there’s little doubt that Nicks will eventually return to the fold. Because all five musicians seem acutely aware that they are stronger together; sometimes they just need some time apart to be reminded of this. And given that their music still seems ubiquitous four decades later, they’re likely to be reminded often.



http://radio.com/2017/02/04/fleetwoo...ours-turns-40/

[SisterNightroad]

40 Years Ago: Fleetwood Mac Make a Masterpiece Out of Messy Relationships on ‘Rumours’

After years simmering beneath the surface of mainstream tastes, Fleetwood Mac finally hit the big time in late 1975. The British blues group, which had been around since 1967 and through various lineup changes since then, recruited a pair of California singer-songwriters for its 10th, self-titled album, and everything almost suddenly changed for them.
Thanks to Lindsey Buckingham and Stevie Nicks, Christine McVie, John McVie and Mick Fleetwood finally scored a No. 1 album, a string of Top 40 hits and a massive tour that helped make them one of the biggest rising bands in the world. And things were about to get a whole lot bigger.
Behind the scenes of all this success, Fleetwood Mac were in a state of disarray — nothing really new for them. But the wrinkles were new this time, as the band’s two couples — Buckingham and Nicks, and the McVies — fell apart. Tensions were high as the three chief songwriters — Buckingham, Nicks and Christine McVie — channeled their aggressions, frustrations and hurt into their new songs.
The result was one of the era’s all-time greatest albums, and a landmark breakup record: Rumours, which was released on Feb. 4, 1977.
The plan was to keep the momentum going after Fleetwood Mac, which was on its way to becoming a hit just as the band began work on its next record. But the group’s personal lives were crumbling around them. The McVies, after six years of marriage, divorced; Fleetwood found out his wife was having an affair around the same time; and Buckingham and Nicks, whose eight-year dating history was marked by fights and periods of cooling off, would barely speak to each other outside of their work.

Plus, other benefits of the rock ‘n’ roll lifestyle — like massive amounts of drugs every day and night — were finding their way inside the once low-key group. All of this made the recording of Rumours, which started in February 1976 at California’s Record Plant studio with co-producers Ken Caillat and Richard Dashut, a fractured and turbulent process. The plan was to have the album in stores in time for the holidays, but when September rolled around — right around the same time Fleetwood Mac hit No. 1 — and the record still wasn’t completed, the schedule was pushed back and a sold-out tour was canceled.
Part of the delay was attributed to Buckingham’s increasing control within the studio. Unlike Fleetwood Mac’s earlier albums, which were rooted in blues, the 1975 album was a pop record, a direction Buckingham steered Rumours toward even more. He, along with Christine McVie, became the album’s architect, as he blended electric and acoustic instruments, pushed for a brighter radio-friendly sound and balanced the voices of the band’s three strong songwriters and singers.
Sessions would begin late and last long, if they ever got started at all. Fleetwood had removed all the clocks from the studio, so nobody had their eyes on the time. Not that it really mattered — between all the coke consumed during the recording and various band members not on speaking terms with other members, sometimes not much would get done anyway.
But once they started to finalize the set of songs they had, the band — along with their producers, who were serving as Buckingham’s engineers, more or less — began to piece together the parts of their greatest album, overdubbing sections on top of sections. Buckingham contributed “Second Hand News,” “Never Going Back Again” and “Go Your Own Way.” McVie wrote and sang “Don’t Stop” (the inspiration behind the LP’s original title, Yesterday’s Gone), “Songbird” and “You Make Loving Fun.” And Nicks — Fleetwood Mac’s breakout star thanks to “Rhiannon” — checked in with “Dreams” (the group’s only No. 1 single) and “Gold Dust Woman.” And the entire band was given credit on “The Chain,” a sorta self-referential look at the state of the band at the time.

They strived for an album with no filler, and they pretty much achieved it. The band’s disintegrating relationships were at the center of the record’s best songs. Buckingham’s “Go Your Own Way,” a middle finger to Nicks, is all seething, spiteful fury capped by an angry, tension-filled guitar solo; McVie’s “You Make Loving Fun” was written for her new boyfriend, the band’s lighting director; and Nicks’ “Dreams” was a reality-soaked assessment of the end of her relationship with Buckingham.
Rumours was loaded with emotional highs and lows, as well as the bitter turmoil they had put each other through and had been through together. It was a personal record about very real breakups, but it was also universal in its approach to the subjects. And, probably for those reasons, it was an immediate hit, reaching No. 1 and staying there for 31 weeks. It’s still one of the Top 10 bestselling albums ever made.
But the toll on the band was huge. Nicks — who sank deeper into a coke addiction — was distraught that one of her best songs, “Silver Springs,” was pulled from the album and relegated to a B-side. Buckingham emerged as the group’s leader, which didn’t sit particularly well with some members, especially Nicks, whose relationship with her ex-boyfriend was at its lowest point (it probably didn’t help matters that she was super-pissed about “Go Your Own Way” and had a rebound fling with Fleetwood to boot). And the band went on tour for what seemed like forever.
By the time they returned in late 1979 with the double-record Tusk, Fleetwood Mac were one of the biggest bands on the planet. Over the next decade, records became less frequent, solo albums took priority and Buckingham left until their 1997 reunion. The messy relationships that inspired their masterpiece were far behind them, but the scars were still there. But what glorious, career-defining scars they were.



Read More: 40 Years Ago: Fleetwood Mac Make a Masterpiece Out of Messy Relationships on 'Rumours' | http://ultimateclassicrock.com/fleet...ckback=tsmclip

[SisterNightroad]

Every Song on Fleetwood Mac's 'Rumours' Ranked

It was 40 years ago today (Feb. 4) that Fleetwood Mac would release Rumours, one of the most successful albums of the rock era, and a rare mega-blockbuster whose thrills are as intricate and subtle as they are broad-stroked and head-smacking.

As much as the record lives on for the lore of the drugs and tangled-web heartbreak that fueled its writing and recording sessions, it's the unnervingly raw emotion and performance -- and the peerlessly immaculate composition and production -- that the album's soap-opera surroundings inspired that makes it still worth writing about in 2017.

Generations later, the songs on Rumours remain nearly as omnipresent on radio and in popular culture as they were in the Carter era, but the set remains exhilarating and inscrutable, because so few songs of love, faith and addiction have ever been this bloody or brilliant.

Here are the album's 11 tracks, ranked from worst to best. (And include an asterisk around No. 4 or 5 for classic B-side "Silver Springs," whose exclusion from the album is basically all you need to know about what a self-destructive hot streak Fleetwood Mac were on at the time.)

11. "Don't Stop"

The only one of the album's original megahits -- peaking at No. 3 on the Billboard Hot 100 in September 1977 -- that time and overplay have been somewhat unforgiving towards, its shimmering stomp feeling more pushy than empowering in its forward-march insistence. Bill Clinton didn't help, of course, but the fact that the song was co-optable for sloganeering purposes in the first place simply means that it was a cut more basic than the rest of Rumours to begin with.

10. "Oh Daddy"

If there's one song you forget about trying to count off the 11 tracks on Rumours, it's probably Christine McVie's penultimate creeper "Oh Daddy," a Neil Young-paced heartache testimony with perilously low self-esteem ("Why are you right when I'm so wrong/ I'm so weak but you're so strong?") It's not the most striking lyric or melody, but the song's gorgeously windswept production makes for some chilling moments, and also allows for a brilliant lead-in to the album's significantly more memorable closer.

9. "Songbird"

Apologies to Christine McVie, who ends up with the three lowest-ranked songs on the album -- she makes up for it with her fourth song on the set, which we'll get to much higher up -- and no hate meant for "Songbird," an entirely lovely piano-and-guitar ballad that makes an exquisite end to the album's A-side. But Fleetwood Mac only have one truly timeless, unforgettable acoustic anthem, and this isn't it.

8. "Second Hand News"

For one of classic rock's definitive albums, it remains a little jarring what a red-herring the set opens with: Lindsey Bukcingham's rollicking "Second Hand News," a sort of "Monday Morning" redux that points towards little of the intrigue and brutality of the rest of the album. Still, the folk jam sneaks in some bitterness among the knee-slapping -- "I know there's nothing to say/ Someone has taken my place" are the set's telling opening lines -- and "Won't you lay me down in tall grass and let me do my stuff" is pantheon-worthy euphemising.

7. "I Don't Want to Know"

Another of the set's folkier numbers, propelled ever forward by some antsy handclaps and a tempo that feels set about 10 bpm faster than it should, creating a nervous energy that would set the tone for much of the album's controversial follow-up, 1979's Tusk. Buckingham and co-lead Stevie Nicks sound almost breathless just trying to keep up, but still manage to bring the necessary anxiousness to point-of-no-return lyrics like "Finally baby/ The truth has been told/ Now you tell me that I'm crazy/ It's nothing that I didn't know."

6. "The Chain"

Not Rumours' best song but arguably its most definitive, and certainly the greatest team effort -- it's the album's only track in which all five members receive writing credits, and also the only one in which McVie, Buckingham and Nicks all contribute to the lead vocal. And with all the gorgeously frayed vocals of betrayal and broken promise, "The Chain" might still be most memorable for Mick Fleetwood's heartbeat-like bass drum, and the slithering John McVie low-end that introduces the song's inspired, not-getting-away-that-easy coda.

5. "Never Going Back Again"

The shortest song on Rumours but also one of the most complete, a masterfully finger-picked Buckingham solo piece that only features the rest of the band in ghostly backing vocals. "Been down one time/ Been down two times/ Never going back again" is a rare statement of resolve on an album full of emotional incapacitation, and as much of an affirmation as it makes from Lindsey's delivered perspective, it's just as devastating when considered from Stevie's received viewpoint.

4. "Gold Dust Woman"

Nicks has openly admitted that she has no idea what Rumours' mystical closing track is even about, which is probably one of the reasons it's played such a large part in building the frontwoman's own gypsy-woman mythology. With its desert-like production, guitar riffs spilling from everywhere like sand through the song's fingers, and Stevie's uniquely possessed vocals, "Gold Dust Woman" is as alluring and enigmatic as its singer -- a note of anti-closure for the LP to end on, the mysteries of love and life forever unknowable.

3. "Go Your Own Way"

A masterpiece of illogical layering and universal songwriting, Buckingham designed the verses of "Go Your Own Way" to sound like the world around him as he cried, "If I could, baby, I'd give you my world/ How can I when you won't take it from me?" before the sing-along chorus applied necessary order to the situation. But Buckingham's critical flaw in this brilliant stop-start rocker was in making going your own way sound less like a dismissal than a granting of release -- compared to spending further time in Lindsey's world of control, another lonely day seems pretty free and easy.

2. "You Make Loving Fun"

The secret weapon of Rumours, shimmying its way out from the thick of the album's B-side, just when you thought it was finally starting to run out of hits. The song's swagger is all hips, like writer McVie trying on a dazzling sequin dress for the first time, while the pre-chorus -- setting up a refrain that doesn't actually show up until the song's very end -- is the album's greatest revelation; Christine offering an ode of hymnal rapture to the man who got her believing in miracles, while the rest of the band plays her sighing gospel choir in the back.

1. "Dreams"

Fleetwood Mac's all-time greatest song (and only Hot 100 No. 1 hit) was a demonstration of the entire band's strengths, from Fleetwood's instantly recognizable opening drum fill to McVie's somehow singular two-note bass pattern to Christine's sweetly bubbling keys giving the groove its plush texture. But it was also the song that proved the band was never more themselves than when Stevie was on the mic, bringing both the thunder and the rain, her unguarded, open-veined rasp painting every one of her crystal visions in such rich, vibrant color that they actually sound like they're causing Buckingham's guitars to openly weep.



http://www.billboard.com/articles/co...ed-anniversary

[dreamsunwind]

I've always thought Go Your Own Way to be the best FM song of all time and just one of the best songs of all time in general. For me at least it's one of those songs like Satisfaction or Smells Like Teen Spirit or Hotel California or Can't Help Falling in Love.

I think that and GDW and The Chain are the best songs on the album. I also really, really love Never Going Back Again so it's weird for me to see people place it kind of low when ranking the album. One of my friends isn't even too much of a FM fan but NGBA is her favorite song ever.

[SisterNightroad]

From the Record Crate: Fleetwood Mac – “Rumours”

What else could possibly be said about one of the highest-selling albums of all time? What could be added to one of rock music’s juiciest bit of backstage gossip? Is it worth talking anymore about the album that turned a folksy California rock band into one of the biggest bands on the planet?

There is relevance to today’s 40th anniversary of Rumours. 1977 was a torn and frayed year for rock and roll as it seemed to be at an awkward crossroads. Punk was starting to kick in with the likes of Television and The Ramones making headway, David Bowie was getting experimental with Brian Eno in Berlin, Queen released the stadium anthem to end all stadium anthems, and Pink Floyd used a floating inflatable pig to mock current politics. It seemed like the easily-digestible, radio-friendly, AOR rock was the least interesting thing about music at the time. So how does an album like Rumours become an international hit and turn Fleetwood Mac into legends? Relationship drama.

Before Taylor Swift was even a gleam in her dad’s eye thinking of the first song she’d write about boys, Fleetwood Mac’s band status was like an episode of Jerry Springer (or for this era, let’s say Phil Donahue). It was a case of good news/bad news for Fleetwood Mac leading up to Rumours: the good news was that the band finally broke into the mainstream with their self-titled 1975 album and hits like “Landslide” and “Rhiannon.” The bad news was that the band was on the verge of breaking up thanks to marital bliss and rockstar life not blending together. Bassist John McVie and keyboardist Christine McVie ended six years of marriage together after nonstop touring took its toll on their relationship, while guitarist Lindsey Buckingham and singer Stevie Nicks were in an off-and-on relationship because the rockstar lifestyle doesn’t encourage monogamy. While Mick Fleetwood thought he’d be exempt from relationship drama being the fifth wheel and all, but it turns out the mother of his two children was having an affair with his best friend.

Despite everyone being on the verge of an emotional meltdown (or possibly already having one) the Mac stepped into the studio and laid their soles out bare. As mentioned when we talked about their 1975 album, Rumours took the blueprint the band laid out on Fleetwood Mac and beefed up the production. Fleetwood’s drums on “Go Your Own Way,” You Make Loving Fun,” and “The Chain” pack a bigger punch, while Buckingham’s finger-picked guitar on the likes of “Second Hand News,” “Dreams” and “Never Going Back Again” feel much more like the lead instrument of the band. The McVie crew also sound crisper, providing a more prominent rhythm backing. The songs continue the combination of the band’s blues origins with the folksy style of Nicks and Buckingham. Whereas on Fleetwood Mac the styles were either separate or early fusions, Rumours had more complete combinations of styles as if the band knew where to place themselves.

Right from the get-go on “Second Hand News,” Rumours makes itself clear that it’s a breakup album (“I know there’s nothing to say/Someone has taken my place”). And Stevie Nicks responds in kind on the very next track, “Dreams” (“It’s only right that you should play the way you feel it/But listen carefully to the sound of your loneliness/Like a heartbeat drives you mad/In the stillness of remembering of what you had”). It’s so fascinating to listen to the back and forth between Nicks and Buckingham throughout the album, picking apart each other and kicking each other to the curb. From the emphatic throwing-up of the hands of “Go Your Own Way,” the folky-stomp of “The Chain,” or the heartbreaking realization of “Oh Daddy” (“Everything you do is just alright/And I can’t walk away from you baby, if I tried”). It closes with “Gold Dust Woman,” a slow-burn ballad with Nicks describing the pursuit of love as an “ancient queen” that no one can ever truly tame. Nicks’ vocals, covered in sexual mystique, are used expertly to question what’s the next move after a broken heart (“And now tell me, is it over now?/Do you know how to pick up the pieces/And go home? Go home, go home”). There are brief bright spots on the record, like the schmaltzy, vanilla “Don’t Stop” that might as well fit in a promo for Ronald Reagan’s presidency. But there’s also “You Make Loving Fun” a funky jam that features Christine McVie singing about moving on to new love (“I never did believe in miracles/But I’ve a feeling it’s time to try/I never did believe in the ways of magic/But I’m beginning to wonder why”).

There’s no mystery as to why Rumours sold like hot cakes. Fleetwood’s songs were crisp yet free-flowing, and featured some of the sharpest writing of 70s rock. In a time when rock was being pulled in multiple directions, Fleetwood Mac were straight to the point and honest with their audience, as well as themselves. Today, drama and torn romance is commonplace what with social media practically a factor to music nowadays. But Rumours had a magic to it, an open forum where a band laid out their hurt bare.



http://theyoungfolks.com/music/from-...-rumours/96575

[SisterNightroad]

FLEETWOOD MAC’S ‘RUMOURS’ TURNS 40: HOW THE ICONIC ROCK ALBUM KEPT THE BAND SANE

Fleetwood Mac’s most famous album, Rumours, is 40-years-old. The landmark album, which made Lindsey Buckingham, Stevie Nicks, Mick Fleetwood, and John and Christine McVie superstars, was released on Feb. 4, 1977. In an interview with ABC News, Stevie Nicks said the making of the album was full of drama, but somehow the music kept the band sane.

“We were having a lot of fun recording those songs, even though we were falling apart,” Stevie said. “If anything was keeping us from falling apart, it was going into the studio every day.”

Fleetwood Mac first formed in England in 1967, but the band didn’t go mainstream until 1975 with the addition of California couple Buckingham and Nicks, who helped the group achieve chart success with the self-titled “White Album.” Two years later, Rumours really put Fleetwood Mac on the map, while doing a number on the band’s personal relationships.

According to Ultimate Classic Rock, Fleetwood Mac’s two couples — Buckingham and Nicks, and the McVies — crumbled during sessions for the blockbuster album. John and Christine McVie decided to end their six-year marriage while making Rumours, while Buckingham and Nicks called off their volatile eight-year relationship for good. Nicks soon began an affair with Mick Fleetwood, a relationship she later admitted was “doomed” from the start.

Fleetwood Mac began recording Rumours in February, 1976, at California’s Record Plant, and the band’s personal problems became the inspiration for the songs. Drug use was rampant, and Rumours co-producer Ken Caillat told ABC News that the band “started throwing champagne in each other’s faces and yelling at each other” during recording sessions and that arguments sometimes broke out in response to the real life song lyrics. Buckingham’s “Go Your Own Way” is a famous jab at Nicks, while McVie’s “You Make Loving Fun” was reportedly written about her new boyfriend, Curry Grant, who worked as a lighting director for the band.

Thanks to the single “Dreams,” Rumours hit No. 1 and stayed there for 31 weeks, making it one of the bestselling albums ever recorded. According to Rolling Stone, Nicks later revealed that she wrote “Dreams” in response to Lindsey’s breakup anthem.

“Even though ‘Go Your Own Way’ was a little angry, it was also honest,” Stevie wrote in the liner notes to the Rumours reissue. “So then I wrote ‘Dreams,’ and because I’m the chiffony chick who believes in fairies and angels, and Lindsey is a hardcore guy, it comes out differently. Lindsey is saying go ahead and date other men and go live your crappy life, and [I’m] singing about the rain washing you clean. We were coming at it from opposite angles, but we were really saying the same exact thing.”

In an interview on Oprah’s Master Class, Stevie admitted that the couple’s decision to join the already established rock band cost them their relationship.

“Lindsey always blamed Fleetwood Mac for the loss of me,” Nicks said. “That had we not joined Fleetwood Mac we would’ve continued on with our music, but we probably would’ve gotten married, and we probably would’ve had a child. And it would have been a different life.”

Still, Nicks said the bandmates all knew Fleetwood Mac was more important than anything else in their lives.

“The band was way more important than each separate person’s problems and we knew that,” the singer revealed. “So we never, ever, with everything that happened to us, ever, let love affairs break Fleetwood Mac up.”

Songs from Rumours have been an important part of pop culture history. President Bill Clinton used the song “Don’t Stop” on his campaign trail, and Fleetwood Mac later played at his Inaugural Ball.

In 1998, Fleetwood Mac performed at the 1998 Grammy Awards in honor of the 20th anniversary of Rumours. Actor Kelsey Grammer introduced the band, who then performed a medley of “Rhiannon,” “Go Your Own Way,” and “Don’t Stop,” three of their biggest songs from the 1970s.

As for those rocky Rumours sessions, Nicks told ABC it wasn’t awful “at all.”

“It was fantastic!” the rock songstress said. “We were rich, we were young, we were falling out of love with each other, but, hey… there was a lot of other men and women in the world, and we were all moving on.”

Rumours won the Grammy Award for album of the year in 1977. The album has sold more than 45 million copies worldwide and remains one of the Top 10 best-selling albums of all time.



http://www.inquisitr.com/3951330/fle...the-band-sane/

[SisterNightroad]

Fleetwood Mac's 'Rumours' Turns 40: 11 of the Best 'Go Your Own Way' Covers

Before throwing amorous lyrical shade became standard chart-topping fodder, there was "Go Your Own Way." The first single from Fleetwood Mac's legendary album, Rumours, spelled out Lindsey Buckingham's then trouble-in-paradise relationship with bandmate Stevie Nicks. Their romantic relationship (surprise!) did not last, but the track became something of a cult favorite for musicians to put their own take on through the years. So in honor of Rumours turning the big 4-0 today (Feb. 4), here's a roundup of some "Go Your Own Way" go-to covers.

Lissie
Don't let the fact that this appears on a Nicholas Sparks movie soundtrack scare off the more discerning of listeners. The folk singer's rendition, from her 2011 Covered Up With Flowers EP, is full-on angsty power ballad at its finest.

The Lumineers
In 2013, for a Grammy Reimagined Series, they chose to put their own twist on the Fleetwood Mac hit. Their slower tempoed-take has that more stripped down, melodic quality you'd want and expect from the band.

Wilson Phillips
The trio's rendition -- from their 2004 album of covers, California -- is, well, quintessential Wilson Phillips. The reason you still feel the need to wave a lighter in the air at a concert.

Boy George
The singer covered the hit on his 2011 studio album Ordinary Alien, which he has performed at some more intimate concerts. The feel-good composition has a reggae undertone to it with that eclectic "get up and dance" signature of the pop icon.

Silverstein
This cover, from their 2009 album A Shipwreck in the Sand, is heavy metal death growl meets early-aughts boy band. A crowd pleaser punctuated by moments that leave you #woke.

The Cranberries
This cover, from the Irish exports' 1996 Faithful Departed album, does not disappoint with its upbeat tempo, solid electric guitar action, and the occasional Enya-esque voice notes.

Keane
The British alt-rock band, who are known to eschew guitars and rely more on the piano, have never shied from covering the greats. In a 2010 radio performance they unveiled their Fleetwood Mac nod. We nominate the rumba shaker for the cover's MVP.

Lea Michele/Glee
By the time Glee went off the air in 2015, there were few songs that hadn't been showcased. But a second season episode, titled "Rumours," was devoted entirely to the Fleetwood Mac album's songs. Whether you A) loved the show B) pretended you didn't watch the show but secretly did, or C) protested its existence, Lea Michele's take undeniably did it justice.

Seaweed
Originally released on a 1993 EP, their cover also makes a memorable appearance on the Clerks movie soundtrack. The sound is textbook grunge out of 1990s Washington state.

Carrie Underwood
In a 2007 Fashion Rocks show the country singer -- still relatively fresh music blood -- went all out. Lindsey Buckingham must have approved, because he joined her on stage.

Colbie Caillat
The Californian likes to break out her rendition of the song at concerts. Her version is faster than you would expect from the musician behind "Bubbly" and "Realize."



https://www.yahoo.com/music/fleetwoo...150059406.html

[SisterNightroad]

5 Best Lyrical Burns From Fleetwood Mac’s ‘Rumours’

Fleetwood Mac’s landmark album Rumours is an absolute monster. It’s one of only nine albums ever released to sell over 20 million copies in the U.S., and 40 years after being unleashed onto the masses, it holds up for its incredible songwriting and its main theme: Cheating, cheating and wait…more cheating.

The making of Rumours, of course, is famous for pretty much everyone in the band breaking up with each other and its other “indulgences.” (AKA: So much cocaine it would make Tony Montana blush.)

In all seriousness: It’s the ultimate cheating/break-up record, and in honor of its anniversary, we’ve ranked the top five best lyrical burns from Rumours.

5. “And if you don’t love me now, you will never love me again.” – “The Chain”
A straight-forward lyric, but it certainly gets its point across.

4. “One thing I think you should know: I ain’t gonna miss you when you go.” – “Second Hand News”
What makes this lyric very stealth is the jaunty melody to which it’s put. You can almost forget how biting it is.

3. “But listen carefully to the sound of your loneliness, like a heartbeat drives you mad in the stillness of remembering what you had and what you lost” – “Dreams”
Okay…now we’re cutting deep.

2. “Rulers make bad lovers. You better put your kingdom up for sale.” – “Gold Dust Woman”
And with that lyric, Stevie Nicks has gone for the Jugular.

1. “Packing up. Shacking up’s all you wanna do.” – “Go Your Own Way”
Could number one really be any other lyric? We can’t even imagine what recording this song in particular must’ve been like.

-

Erica Banas is a rock/classic rock reporter. The first man she ever loved was Jack Daniel. (True story.)



http://wror.com/2017/02/04/5-best-ly...-macs-rumours/

[bombaysaffires]

Originally Posted by SisterNightroad

5 Best Lyrical Burns From Fleetwood Mac’s ‘Rumours’

Fleetwood Mac’s landmark album Rumours is an absolute monster. It’s one of only nine albums ever released to sell over 20 million copies in the U.S., and 40 years after being unleashed onto the masses, it holds up for its incredible songwriting and its main theme: Cheating, cheating and wait…more cheating.

The making of Rumours, of course, is famous for pretty much everyone in the band breaking up with each other and its other “indulgences.” (AKA: So much cocaine it would make Tony Montana blush.)

In all seriousness: It’s the ultimate cheating/break-up record, and in honor of its anniversary, we’ve ranked the top five best lyrical burns from Rumours.

5. “And if you don’t love me now, you will never love me again.” – “The Chain”
A straight-forward lyric, but it certainly gets its point across.

4. “One thing I think you should know: I ain’t gonna miss you when you go.” – “Second Hand News”
What makes this lyric very stealth is the jaunty melody to which it’s put. You can almost forget how biting it is.

3. “But listen carefully to the sound of your loneliness, like a heartbeat drives you mad in the stillness of remembering what you had and what you lost” – “Dreams”
Okay…now we’re cutting deep.

2. “Rulers make bad lovers. You better put your kingdom up for sale.” – “Gold Dust Woman”
And with that lyric, Stevie Nicks has gone for the Jugular.

1. “Packing up. Shacking up’s all you wanna do.” – “Go Your Own Way”
Could number one really be any other lyric? We can’t even imagine what recording this song in particular must’ve been like.



http://wror.com/2017/02/04/5-best-ly...-macs-rumours/

You gotta include
"You say women, they will come and they will go...When the rain washes you clean, you'll know"

"Did she make you cry? Make you break down? Shatter your illusions of love?
Well is it over now......do you know how....pick up the pieces and go home"

[michelej1]

Originally Posted by bombaysaffires

You gotta include
"You say women, they will come and they will go...When the rain washes you clean, you'll know"

"Did she make you cry? Make you break down? Shatter your illusions of love?
Well is it over now......do you know how....pick up the pieces and go home"

I am not sure how that line from Dreams sounds like a burn.

But I agree with you on the part from GDW and also the way Stevie and Lindsey sometimes did it in concert which was dramatic and aggressive was a pretty exciting acknowledgment of the taunt. During the SYW tour it got to the point where he'd be stamping his feet and she'd be screaming, "did she make you cry, make you break down..."

He advanced as she retreated, until she finally got to the "Go hoooome" scream. I liked that rendition of it, especially.

Michele