Mark Needham audio interview on Say You Will

[WalkAThinLine.]

I've been reading a bunch of interviews from around the Say You Will era, which has given me a greater appreciation for the album. I also came across the four minute audio Q&A with Mark Needham, who ended up mixing nearly every track on the album.

He mentions here that Warner Bros initiated the collaboration between him and Buckingham when they asked Needham to help out with Buckingham's solo album, which he said lasted roughly four-five months. He said that the band gradually became more interested in Buckingham's work and that the material was later repurposed for a Fleetwood Mac album. They then rented a house in Bel Air (which is seen in the Destiny Rules documentary) and later transitioned over to Needham's Chatsworth studio. He recalled that the studio was wired with cameras and that Lindsey would often go outside of the studio to have certain discussions that he didn't want captured on tape. Later in the interview, Needham alluded to an argument between the two of them that occurred just outside the recording studio. He was also asked about his favorite songs on the album, where he cited the title track and "Bleed to Love Her".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HaFNf5LXpfg

[Villavic]

He recalled that the studio was wired with cameras and that Lindsey would often go outside of the studio to have certain discussions that he didn't want captured on tape.

I've always thought that if they know they're being recorded, they're not being completely spontaneous, they'll think carefully about what they say, so they're not 100% genuine. I'm not criticizing them. What deserves to be private should be private.

[bombaysaffires]

I've been reading a bunch of interviews from around the Say You Will era, which has given me a greater appreciation for the album. I also came across the four minute audio Q&A with Mark Needham, who ended up mixing nearly every track on the album.

He mentions here that Warner Bros initiated the collaboration between him and Buckingham when they asked Needham to help out with Buckingham's solo album, which he said lasted roughly four-five months. He said that the band gradually became more interested in Buckingham's work and that the material was later repurposed for a Fleetwood Mac album. They then rented a house in Bel Air (which is seen in the Destiny Rules documentary) and later transitioned over to Needham's Chatsworth studio. He recalled that the studio was wired with cameras and that Lindsey would often go outside of the studio to have certain discussions that he didn't want captured on tape. Later in the interview, Needham alluded to an argument between the two of them that occurred just outside the recording studio. He was also asked about his favorite songs on the album, where he cited the title track and "Bleed to Love Her".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HaFNf5LXpfg


great find, thanks for sharing!

[Villavic]

They then rented a house in Bel Air

Yes, he said and then the band went in and rented a house in Bel Air and set up a studio there.

Who actually paid the rent? I mean who usually pay for the studio, all the band members? Or the label? or the producers, or they look for investors like movie or theatre productions? Cause that also defines who benefits from the sales and how, or to whom the revenue goes.

[Tusky]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HaFNf5LXpfg

Thanks that's great! As time goes on, this era is always super interesting to me (as is Behind The Mask)

[bombaysaffires]

Yes, he said and then the band went in and rented a house in Bel Air and set up a studio there.

Who actually paid the rent? I mean who usually pay for the studio, all the band members? Or the label? or the producers, or they look for investors like movie or theatre productions? Cause that also defines who benefits from the sales and how, or to whom the revenue goes.

at that point it would have been the band, because they were essentially making the album on spec... they did not have a label at that point, which is why they had the various execs coming to the house to listen to the songs they had recorded and make offers. At one point as Mick states in the doc, they were looking like pretty set to go with Interscope, and then at the last minute Warners wanted a shot and came out and listened (you see this in the doc) and then it became a bunch of back and forth with the competing offers until they finally chose to go with the Warners offer.

So the band would have been covering costs knowing they would likely get someone to bite and seems likely they would negotiate recouping the costs somewhere in the contract. If Lindsey had a deal for a solo record and recorded a bunch of his stuff using the advance from that record company before it morphed into a band album..he'd owe them a solo album and if they didn't get one from him he'd owe them that money back... But even if he did have some of that money that covered recording his stuff early on, none of that would have been used to record Stevie's stuff... and in the doc don't they say the men of Mac have been at the house recording for like 6 months to a year without Stevie and then she showed up to put her vocals on?

How the band divvied things up internally who knows. They seemed very careful to split the number of songs (and hence money) 50-50 between the two songwriters. This is why Lindsey makes the statement that if they went to 18 songs or whatever for a double album he'd have to eat a **** ton of money because he would have more songs than Stevie but wouldn't get more of a share. No idea how monies got split with Mick and John though.

[cbBen]

The money Lindsey said he was willing to eat in order to make it a double album was producer fees, because he was willing to let them price it as a single album and reduce his producer fees in so doing.