Holyier than thou.....

[Wild Heart SLN]

It has been rumoured that John Mick and Christine have had a holyier than thou attitude toward stevie and lindsey when they joined fm..like Christine didnt like Stevie's stage antics and all her theatrics(which Im in love with by the way:nod: ) Christine had more hit singles than Stevie yet shes not near as noticed as Stevie and I think she was/is really jealous about everything....and stevie still stayed kind...What does everyone think about it?

[celestenadia]

I never heard that one:distress: Stevie has said that her and
Christine really bonded in the beginning...sleeping on top of
speakers while on tour...and they were both having relationships crumble
at the same time. Heck, Stevie even wrote a song, ("Think About It")
for Christine:nod:

[David]

Originally posted by Wild Heart SLN
It has been rumoured that John Mick and Christine have had a holyier than thou attitude toward stevie and lindsey when they joined fm..like Christine didnt like Stevie's stage antics and all her theatrics(which Im in love with by the way:nod: ) Christine had more hit singles than Stevie yet shes not near as noticed as Stevie and I think she was/is really jealous about everything....and stevie still stayed kind...What does everyone think about it?
I think Christine thought Stevie had a great sense of humor in 1975, but turned into an airhead later on.

I was watching parts of the unreleased studio footage from the Tusk documentary the other day, & I really thought that Christine & Lindsey & Mick treated Stevie pretty badly. It was obvious & I cringed a little for Stevie. Listening to Stevie talk about something or explain something, the others either ignored her altogether or else made snide comments to each other about what she was saying or wore these "oh-brother, nutso-is-at-it-again" smirks on their faces. In the "Angel" scenes that were trimmed, Lindsey is patronizing with her, explaining things to her as if he were instructing a six-year-old.

It's no bloody wonder that, once she had some leverage power, she ran screaming into a solo career & planted herself there for two decades.

[Wild Heart SLN]

i think your right..I didnt say I agreed I just figured id ask people what they thought about it :)

[Wild Heart SLN]

See I think generally they were nice to stevie..but remember the time when Stevie was singing rhiannon on stage and Lindsey was really pissed off at her and he put his shirt over his head and started making fun of her? Stevie was the nice one..and I think stevie's personality and her eccentric thoughts got to them....I love her for it and Ithink shes perfect...I get that from people too...they think your crazy or something but the only ones who really know are the macs and stevie and lindsey :nod:

[wondergirl9847]

Originally posted by David
I was watching parts of the unreleased studio footage from the Tusk documentary the other day, & I really thought that Christine & Lindsey & Mick treated Stevie pretty badly. It was obvious & I cringed a little for Stevie. Listening to Stevie talk about something or explain something, the others either ignored her altogether or else made snide comments to each other about what she was saying or wore these "oh-brother, nutso-is-at-it-again" smirks on their faces. In the "Angel" scenes that were trimmed, Lindsey is patronizing with her, explaining things to her as if he were instructing a six-year-old.

But wouldn't THEY know her better than we? Maybe they heard her say silly things all the time and stuff we have never heard. :shrug: I dunno, I'm not trying to say she's an airhead or stupid or anything (I love her too!!) so don't anyone get up in my cookies about this (:laugh: ), I'm just saying, we don't know the whole story about why they act a certain way towards each other, but I think they are like NORMAL FRIENDS who poke fun at each other, laugh at each other, roll their eyes, but they LOVE AND ADORE each other too. :nod:

[Wild Heart SLN]

Precisely Wondergirl ::nod:

[laurarox]

In all the behind the scenes footage I've seen, I thought the band was pretty cruel to Stevie. You're right - they either ignore her or act annoyed by her presence. And I always wondered the same thing. Is there a little jealousy because of the attention she gets (they are all equally talented - but she has always had more celebrity then the rest of them) or is there a genuine reason for the cold shoulder? As much as I adore Stevie, I bet she could be a handful back in the day!

[Robert]

Lets consider the era and the people we are discussing. Everyone, but particularly Mick and Stevie ,were coked out of their collective gords smoking plenty of weed,gobbling hash brownies ,guzzling gallons of Remy Martin and Courvosier and generally carrying on as hedonistically as possible and for a huge rock band in El LAy in the late seventies that was hedonistic indeed.Now this behavior was generally acceptable in that mileau and in that time. .Remember Stevie did not even believe that cocaine was addictive! So when you mix in that 'high life'with the fractured and clandestine relationships of that group of folks it would seem almost anything was possible and the scene was rife with grandiosity.strife, love, hate, alliances and recriminations. No one was completely without blame and no one was totally guilty.It truly was a modern day Shakespearian drama.I also think it is one of those things that basically you really had to be there.In some ways it really was the end of the innocence the last gasp of the good times before AIDS and crack brought the curtain down.So particularly for younger people it may be difficult to have a frame of reference for all this.Just listen to Rumours and Tusk in particular though and you may get some of the gist of it.

[Sorcerer386]

The only thing I remember specifically said about the treatment of Stevie (and Lindsey) was that when they first joined Fleetwood Mac, Christine, John, and Mick were very "clique-ish" at first, so I suppose Stevie and Lindsey felt a little like outsiders for a while.

[Johnny Stew]

While it's true that any discussion of the various relationships within Fleetwood Mac, need to be placed within the context of the time these events were occuring, I don't think it excuses anyone from mistreating anyone else.

I am sure Stevie was not perfect... none of us are, we're only human and so is she.... but it does seem that their treatment of her was a bit heavy-handed.
Obviously they didn't treat Lindsey that way... and he was "some young upstart who came in and tried to take charge."
He and John butted heads often, and yet the band didn't treat him with the same kind of condescension with which they treated Stevie.

What's really sad is the fact that, when Stevie started speaking out in 1991-1994 about the band politics, and how she was often treated, she was viewed as being an ungrateful, bitter bitch.
True, she probably would have never said half the stuff she did, if it werent for the bad shape she was in emotionally and physically, because of the Klonopin addiction... but... she was being brutally honest.

If anyone cares to look back over interviews she has given over the years (prior to 1991, and after 1995), Stevie has always been very kind and complimentary toward everyone in the band. She's always talked fondly of Christine and her music, and even when their relationship was its nadir, she would call Lindsey a genius, and she'd give him a lot of credit for the band's success.

And yet, if you read back thru interviews with the other members, they'd often make very snide comments about Stevie.
Christine would refer to her songs as "mostly rubbish", and say they were "boring."
Lindsey referred to Stevie's concert performances as "a lounge act."
And so on, and so on.

If Stevie had hurt feelings due to those things, I say it's very understandable.


But.... thankfully they seem to have ALL put that behind them.
And more than anything, that is what's most important.
They worked thru whatever problems they had with each other... jealousy, bitterness, whatever... and they moved forward.
To me, that's highly commendable.



Johnny Stew

[estranged4life]

I have seen is from the Tusk photo shoot. Lindsey looks kinda po'd when Stevie & John can't keep their hands off of each other...So I will take y'all word on it...Maybe Stevie was starting to become a DIVA/Drama Queen back then,Who knows???...lol...=)

From what I have read about the way the other members of 'Mac thought of Stevie is similar to the way the FORMER members of Guns N' Roses thought of Axl...They couldnt handle that he was the center of attention and that they,(With the exception of Slash), Were seen as little more than backing members...I feel they,(the 'Mac members...), No longer feel that way about Stevie...Obviously...lol...Brian

[Robert]

I think Christine's comments about Stevie's songs have to be taken in the context of the entire interveiw.Christine was discussing how very prolific Stevie was at the time and that all her songs were like babies to her even though some of them are rubbish.By this she most likely meant that they weren't all well crafted enough to work on a Fleetwood Mac or solo album and indeed many of the songs she has written will most likely never be seen on a commercial release.However this comment was made in the wake of the enormous sucess of Bella Donna so there could be a bit of professional jealously and I personally thought alot of Christine's 1984 eponymous solo lp was boring so it is all just a matter of taste I guess.

[Les]

I would say the same about Lindsey's comment too. I just saw this mentioned the other day on another message board as well. The "lounge act" thing was about Lindsey's sort of minor disappointment in seeing Stevie's solo band and Christine's solo band do note-for-note covers of a lot of FM material in their solo shows. He was hoping to see both of them make more of an individual statement as solo artists apart of FM. Nevertheless, he said in more than one interview that he still thought they were both very good.

There is a Charlie Rose interview out there from 1984 where Charlies asks Lindsey what he thinks of Stevie's success and he begins to say how he thinks she's worked really hard and is very deserving...until Charlie cuts him off in mid-sentence with a smirk and "Are you jealous?!" Nice.

One thing that I think a lot of this boils down to is that one person's brutal honesty is another person's unkindness and vice versa.

PS - Lindsey also referred to feeling like he himself was a lounge act at times during the early FM days when he covered the Green, Welch and Kirwan tunes. It wasn't about not liking those songs, it was just about not being able to do his own, which would understandably be a different feeling for him.

[Johnny Stew]

Robert and Les... you both have very good points.
I'm sure some of these quotes were even taken a bit out of context in the original interviews... or perhaps the statements were qualified with explanations that the interviewer or editor chose to leave out.

But I can definitely see why those kinds of things, and then their condescension towards her in the studio, would leave the "ever sensitive" Stevie feeling a little betrayed.

Whether they had valid reasons for saying the things they did, the comments still seemed a little less than kind, and I can see why it would cause hurt feelings.

And to his credit, there were times over the years when Lindsey would seem downright protective of Stevie.
I suppose that's yet another example of the love/hate relationship they had for so long.

Again, I'm just glad that "yesterday's gone," and that they've all moved forward.... even if we still cant get them to complete their albums any faster!
;)



Johnny Stew

[ejof17]

I think alot of their supposed cruelty toward Stevie was a result of human nature and just plain jealousy. Stevie is really the only member that is a real star in her own right. If Lindsey ever releases his solo album, he will be lucky to sell 100,000 copies and it won't do anything on the charts. It's a numbers game.
(Please no flames for this!!!) Honestly, it's the truth. The others are stars because of FM only and are honored as R&R pioneers certainly.

Stevie's stage antics and image have emblazoned her in the conciousness of pop culture. Stevie's TISL will shortly be Platinum, certainly after the release of the new FM album and she is firmly seated as an inspiration to countless performers.