MacNuggets

[vivfox]

Within the first few notes of opener “Love That’s Gone”—before a single word is uttered—it’s pretty clear that Sees the Light is a breakup record. In fact, Vivian Girls bassist Katy Goodman’s second long-player under the La Sera moniker could convey the emotions of eternally gray days even if the vocals were completely stripped away.

Then again, the song titles leave little to the imagination (“Break My Heart,” “It’s Over Now,” “Don’t Stay”). And that opening song is a heartbreaker, traipsing along like a lost track from Fleetwood Mac’s post-breakup album Tusk (Christine McVie’s opening saddy “Over and Over” comes to mind). Even the crystalline guitar lines running through “Love That’s Gone” sound as if they could be traced back to Lindsey Buckingham.

Sees the Light does benefit, however, from Goodman’s pure and honeyed voice—it’s what brings the record’s 10 bare-bones garage pop songs to life.

http://www.pastemagazine.com/article...the-light.html

[michelej1]

Excerpt from interview with Bethany and Bob of Best Coast

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/culture...-second-album/

Bethany and Bobb wanted to make a "darkier and grimier" sound without scaring people away. They worked with Jon Brion (Fiona Apple, Brad Mehldau, Elliott Smith) and recorded The Only Place at the iconic Capitol Records, a sign of the success of Crazy For You. Aside from working with one of the best producers around, how else did they get through the second album doldrums? Well, Fleetwood Mac played a part. Bethany explained:


I was obsessed with Tusk by Fleetwood Mac and Bobb bought me a book about the recording process for my birthday. It was similar to what we were going through. They had just come out of Rumours, and we were coming off Crazy. I read it five times and always had it in my purse and in the studio. Tusk was made in a different way, they spent more time on it, which is how we approached the second record as well.

[David]

David Gans was a San Francisco rock critic who was the preeminent Grateful Dead chronicler. He was also a big Machead. These Gans photos are from 1982.

[LB Freakazoid]

A little more than a mcnugget...

http://www.theonion.com/articles/wel...is-uncl,27979/


Well, Well, Well, Look Who’s Come Crawling To His Uncle To Hear His Fleetwood Mac Concert Stories
BY MICHAEL FLEISCHMANN
APRIL 21, 2012 | ISSUE 48•16


Ah, my dear nephew, I thought those were your steps I heard. Allow me to pause this Mirage concert bootleg; may I ask to what I owe this unexpected visit? Surely you haven’t come to my basement hideaway to spend the evening hours with your doddering old uncle, who, as you have made abundantly clear so many times before, has nothing at all to teach you—

But, wait, what’s that you say? Do my ears deceive me? Has my headstrong nephew at long last come to his senses and crawled back to hear his uncle’s Fleetwood Mac concert stories?

My, my, my, it seems the chickens have come home to roost. Imagine, after all this time my brother’s son would let go of his foolish pride and ask his uncle to conjure the sights and sounds of the great Fleetwood Mac during their immortal Lindsey Buckingham–era tours. That same stubborn youth who for years spitefully refused to hear the legendary tales of the greatest touring band of the modern age now approaches humbled, begging me to take him away to the amphitheaters and parking lots of old.

How I have waited for this day to come.

But have you not been given your chances? From the beginning, I offered you free access to my most treasured of remembrances. From the Mac’s fabled performance before 18,000 enraptured fans in Indianapolis in 1977, when I managed to sneak in a jug of Thunderbird and stole some guy’s jacket. Or that storied sound check at the Vet in Fort Wayne, when I convinced arena personnel I was Lindsey’s guitar tech and watched in awed silence as he and John McVie tuned up and ran through an instrumental version of “Landslide” before security was alerted to my presence and I was removed from the venue.

These anecdotes and so many others lay well within your grasp, and yet you brushed them aside, turning your back on me. And now, look at you.

Pathetic. Completely and utterly pathetic.

What you should have realized, nephew, is that these memories of mine cannot be bought or sold, but to you I offered them free of charge. And why? So you could tell me how “boring” and “lame” Fleetwood Mac is? So you in all your teenaged wisdom could point out how Mick Fleetwood looks like a “queer pirate” on the cover of Rumours, that pinnacle of compositional achievement? So you could shy away as I attempted to convey the indescribable pleasures your Aunt Carol and I experienced in so many post-concert trysts, the music still hot in our ears?

And after all that scorn and ignorance, here you kneel before me with your tail between your legs, pleading with me to bring you back to those wondrous nights, knowing full well that the power to do so now lies with me and me alone. How the tide has turned.

But possibly I can forgive. Possibly. For I admit I am not entirely surprised to see you here tonight. Your father tells me he has lately heard the haunting strains of “Gold Dust Woman” floating from your bedroom. And even now I see your eyes darting over my collection of priceless concert mementos, each one of which leads to a time and place not so distant in memory. A time and place where the summers were hot, the beer was cold, and the music of Fleetwood Mac, and occasionally Supertramp, cast the world in the glow of song.

Of course, to explain what this all means will take time. But perhaps you are ready to understand, and perhaps I can forgive a child’s carelessness.

Because even children get older. And I’m getting older, too.

Here, come closer. Take this. It is a kerchief thrown from the stage by Stevie Nicks during the band’s performance at the Richfield Coliseum in 1980. A gift from Rhiannon herself, and a handsome reward for enduring a 12-hour overnight bus ride to catch the group at the height of its powers during the Tusk tour. She was pretty stoned that night, but the band was cooking.

The kerchief, now: Take it, do not be afraid. Breathe deep, my boy. Fall away. Do you smell that? Lavender. Now we will never break the Chain.

[Sanne2]

The History Of The Hollywood Sign: 1978: A Sign Is Reborn
By the late 1970′s, the Hollywood Chamber of Commerce determined that the Sign required a complete rebuilding – carrying a price tag of a quarter million dollars. Thankfully, some of showbiz’s biggest names came to the rescue. In ’77, Fleetwood Mac pledged a charity concert, but local residents prevented it.

http://www.hollywoodsign.org/the-his...ign-is-reborn/

[vivfox]

Fleetwood Mac: "What Makes You Think You're the One" from Tusk: "This drum part brought to you by mountains of cocaine. [Mick Fleetwood] had to be out of his mind on this song. It's like he's just about to fall apart. So brilliant. Don't take cocaine, people, unless you're Fleetwood Mac, in which case it totally works for you. Until it didn't."

http://www.npr.org/blogs/allsongs/20...of-telekinesis

[vivfox]

Please Help..lol
May 3, 2012
A few years ago I downloaded a clip of Fleetwood Mac live on stage performing Tusk.
The coulour war redish and the marching band came onto the stage during the drum solo
Can anyone tell me when that was and if there is a video of that show
I see ther is a new one in HD ....Is this the same show??
My computer crashed and now I cannot remember as I have done the chemo thing and memory has been affected...lol
I am on a mission so if someone can help....please do....thanks and let me tell you The music of Fleetwood Mac did wonders for me when I was in the ...".chemo time".... not all the time but when I needed it...
.Thank you you guys...I am sure there are many that would have liked to have thanked you for your music....but did not have the time to do it....so for them I say.....THANK YOU

http://www.fleetwoodmac.com/blog/sel...please-helplol

[TrueFaith77]

http://cityarts.info/2012/05/08/citizen-artist/

Citizen-Artist
by Armond White
A Noel Coward Film Series to Remember

In a Noël Coward-worthy lyric, a pop singer-songwriter once mused about “the stillness of remembering what you had and what you lost.” Seeing some of the newly restored 35mm prints of classic Noël Coward films in the Film Society of Lincoln Center’s Coward on Film (May 11-13) inspires such wistfulness.

Stevie, the anglophile, would appreciate this compliment, I'd think.

[Sanne2]

PAUL THORN'S WHAT THE HELL IS GOIN' ON? DUE MAY 8th
http://www.paulthorn.com/sneak/index.html

The collection, entitled What The Hell Is Goin' On? (due May 8th on Perpetual Obscurity/Thirty Tigers) finds Thorn putting his own gritty rock stamp on some of his favorite songs. There are some names familiar to Americana fans (Buddy Miller, Ray Wylie Hubbard), some lesser-known (Foy Vance, Wild Bill Emerson) and some surprises. The Buckingham/Nicks tune Don't Let Me Down Again originated on that duo's debut, not during the Fleetwood Mac era

[TrueFaith77]

THREE Stevie/Mac references in this review of the Niki & The Dove album INSTINCT:

http://www.nme.com/reviews/niki-and-the-dove/13145

Spirit animals bound, prowl and pounce through Niki And The Dove’s debut. Also hurricanes, crystals and visions. Our Swedish duo can pump out all the dry ice they want and singer Malin Dahlström can streak her cheeks like Stevie Nicks on the trapeze, but they can’t disguise themselves: no animist shamans these, but precise technicians.

They use elements freely available. Here a Mac, there a Knife, everywhere a Prince. But it’s the magic of combination, when a mysterious catalyst appears from nowhere that makes it.

‘In Our Eyes’ has echoes of Fleetwood Mac’s ‘Gypsy’, gaseous synths like an ’80s Pat Benatar power ballad, ending in a tip of the hat to Bowie’s ‘The Man Who Sold The World’.

The album is streaming here. Kinda does sound like a mix of Stevie and Kate Bush. Like Kate's voice but Stevie's vowels.

http://www.nme.com/news/niki-and-the-dove/63671

[vivfox]

Sometimes, the creative force behind a million-selling record doesn't just want to reinvent the style that earned a fortune – they want to tear it down.

In 1979, Fleetwood Mac were perhaps the biggest band in the world, having shifted more than 10 million copies of Rumours. The next album, their 12th, was Tusk, a wildly oscillating double LP that sounded like the work of separate solo artists, was packaged in what was surely a deliberately awful sleeve, and contained no obvious singles. To this day, non-aficionados only know Sara – it and the title track were modest hits at the time.

While the sound of Rumours was pristine and built for radio, Tusk was all over the show. Rumours had famously, fearlessly catalogued the bitter end of Lindsey Buckingham's relationship with Stevie Nicks, and Christine McVie's with John McVie, as well as several awkward dalliances that followed. On Tusk, Christine McVie and Stevie Nicks sounded all talked out, happy to submit tender, regretful fragments like Honey Hi and Beautiful Child. But they're punctuated by the songs of Lindsey Buckingham, which are best described as furious polkas, and dominate the record.

"Lindsey was a volatile, domineering personality and the rest just went with it," says Paphides. "People were worried about him. He turned up at the studio on day three and had cut all his hair off, standing in front of the mirror with a pair of scissors."

But while Buckingham stuffed his songs with multi-directional rage, and with the influence of punk and new wave, he had also become a skilled producer who could bring out the best in his bandmates' radically different compositions – even those of his ex, Stevie Nicks.

"There's still a lot of love between Stevie and Lindsey and she's happy for him that Tusk has become feted as a classic," says Paphides. "He never tried to inflict his scratchy, lo-fi, I'm-going-crazy production on her. The Stevie songs have lovely, luxuriant waves of elegant melancholy enveloping you. He knows exactly what she wants to achieve. It's the same with Christine McVie: Over and Over sounds just beautiful. As long as Lindsey could have his own way with his songs he'd do a good job for you."

Paphides spent four months tracking down Buckingham and scoring an interview, "Now Lindsey's very LA, very Zen, very 'I've been to therapy'. He's also very aware and proud of Tusk's reputation."

But in '79? "He was angry. If you have a Lindsey Buckingham character, there's a part of you that wants to destroy all you're best known for.

http://www.radiotimes.com/news/2012-...welfth)-albums

[vivfox]

True, covering local sports during the summer months allows me the freedom of loosing myself from the computer a bit more. It also takes me away from late-night stresses of tracking down game results from all corners of north Georgia -- not to mention putting up with co-workers who think listening to Fleetwood Mac actually aids the working process for all within earshot. (No offense to you Fleetwood Mac fans out there; it’s simply not my cup of tea.)

http://www.accessnorthga.com/detail.php?n=249093

[michelej1]

Originally Posted by vivfox

-- not to mention putting up with co-workers who think listening to Fleetwood Mac actually aids the working process for all within earshot. (No offense to you Fleetwood Mac fans out there; it’s simply not my cup of tea.)

That's pretty funny. I understand though. Except for when I'm in the car, I'm not really into music as background, not even music I like. I might not get much work done with FM playing. Michele

[michelej1]

Soundtrack for Writing: Fleetwood Mac – Rumors
Posted: June 2, 2012 in Music , by Nathan Crowder

http://nathancrowder.com/2012/06/02/...od-mac-rumors/


It’s been a while since I’ve done a Soundtrack for Writing post. And this will not be like the others, so if you’ve missed the previous ones, you won’t be penalized.

Despite this being a truly excellent album, the reasons we’re talking about it here have very little to do with the music itself. Don’t get me wrong. Some of the bigger tracks on the album, notably “The Chain,” “Go Your Own Way,” and “Gold Dust Woman” have an energy that will fuel many a writing bender. And quieter songs such as “Songbird” and “Oh Daddy” will break your goddamned heart. From beginning to end, it’s a solid album well worth listening to.

But why this album is particularly good for me to have in the catalog for writing?

Because it got made at all.

The year before Rumors was recorded, the band had their biggest hit yet and went on a grueling six month tour. By the end of the tour, bassist John McVie and pianist/vocalist Christine McVie’s eight year marriage ended in divorce. They weren’t even talking to each other socially, and yet they were expected to go back into the studio, write new music, and produce a follow-up.

It didn’t help that two other band members–guitarist Lindsey Buckingham and vocalist Stevie Nicks–were going through a bit of tumultuous on-again-off-again relationship and were also fighting by the time they got to Sausalito, CA, to record. Apparently the only time they weren’t arguing was when they were working on songs together.

Oh, and Mic Fleetwood, the drummer from whom the band derived its name? He had recently discovered that his wife and mother of two children had an affair with his best friend–made only better I assume by the fact that at least the best friend wasn’t in the band.

Suffice to say, there was a lot of emotion in that studio. I suspect it could have easily ended in flames at any point in the recording session. Everyone was tense. The band members didn’t socialize outside of actually working on the album. They were writing and singing some very personal songs about what was going on in their lives–often all into the same microphone, looking across at the other band members who were intimately familiar with the story behind the lyrics. To make things more interesting, there were some technical problems with the master tapes that could have sunk the whole album. Plus, there was enough cocaine flowing through the studio to make Charlie Sheen look “quaint.”

But the kept going, recording an album that was, in Buckingham’s words, “…more than the sum of it’s parts.” After more than two months, they toured for ten days to try out the new material in front of an audience, then went back to the studio to finish laying down tracks and engineering.

Despite delays, despite the conflict, despite the pressure of crafting a follow-up to their biggest album yet, Fleetwood Mac released perhaps the most important album of their careers. But those aren’t my words. That was Mick Fleetwood’s opinion.

If Fleetwood Mac can do that, I have no legitimate excuses to not finish my writing projects. I doubt any of you reading this do, either.

Writing isn’t easy. Everyone has things going on in their personal lives that make sitting down and doing the work difficult. I’ll admit, some days I get home and I’m frustrated with my day job, or distracted by some relationship hiccup or another. The last thing I want to do is write. Or edit. Or really anything other than curl up on the sofa and listen to music.

But creating art, be it a classic album or a weird little horror short story, can be a release. It can be a place to dump the hardships of the day and power through, turning the coal into diamonds.

And for that, if nothing else, Rumors is an essential in my writing soundtracks.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to crank up “The Chain” and work on a combat sequence that, as fate would have it, involve an iron chain being used as a weapon.

Happy writing!

[michelej1]

[Using Rumours to mock Auckland telecommunications problems]
Computer World, New Zealand, June 8, 2012
http://computerworld.co.nz/news.nsf/...fry-up-rumours

Rumours

It was back in 1976, newborn girl babies around the known world were being named Rhiannon and Fleetwood Mac was grappling with that difficult eleventh album. Amidst – to quote Wikipedia – “hedonistic behaviour and interpersonal strife” the band created one the greatest easy listening LPs of all time – Rumours.

The same climate of dysfunction is manifesting itself right now in the local telecommunications industry, with cashed up companies eyeing each other across the Tasman. Vodafone may be buying TelstraClear, Telstra may be buying Telecom... and some other unsubstantiated industry gossip that Fry Up is working on getting on the record.

Anyhoo, if the telco industry today is like F Mac back in ‘76 then TelstraClear would be Stevie Nicks. She seems to have caused the most trouble, she couldn’t play an instrument, but every so often she came up with a song that was usually the best on the album.

Telstra considering selling TelstraClear to Vodafone
Telstra eyeing Telecom

Go your own way
Just kidding, government IT departments. Of course you can’t do your own thing.

Not anymore, not now that Colin MacDonald is in charge at the Department of Internal Affairs.

MacDonald told an audience of senior bureaucrats recently that it’s the 'common way' or 'no way' when it comes to technology. Government agencies will automatically be “opting in” to the “common capability” ICT tools.

“Yes, you can opt out.” Phew.

“The bar to opting out will be set high.” Oh dear.

“Just how high is the subject of a paper going to ministers very soon.” Gotcha.

DIA chief urges officials to use common tools

Don’t stop
It was the theme song to Bill Clinton’s presidential campaign and it could well become the theme song to the Institute of IT Professionals, or IITP for those who prefer their tech news be communicated in acronyms.

CEO Paul Matthews says the research shows that the new name for the New Zealand Computer Society will be more appealing to the younger crowd:

“Twice as many of the public identified with the new name over the old and 82 percent would 'trust' the new name over the old one. This is even more pronounced when we look at those under 30.”

Don’t stop thinking about tomorrow. The past is so over.

Computer Society renamed Institute of IT Professionals