I'm not crazy about the lyrics... but the arrangement is beautiful. And the instruments are sublime... Sonically, I love the raw vocal..

It could be ... that ... that was a scratch vocal.. and she was just throwing in pot luck lyrics.. just to get the arrangement down..

I'm enjoying the Tusk tour live discs so much. The sound quality is so warm and crisp, it's like I'm floating on a cloud when I listen to it on headphones. It's an immersive and satisfying experience. I like the way the guitar and keyboards are mixed; the reverb on Lindsey's guitar sounds really nice. I wouldn't mind if they had included Think About Me, but I'm glad they included That's Enough for Me, which I'd previously only heard in a poor-quality audience bootleg from Rotterdam. A couple of the selected tracks might rank as my favorite performances ever of those songs (Landslide, World Turning, Songbird, to name a few). Even You Make Loving Fun is taken to another level due to Lindsey's guitar work. I feel that the band was at their peak in terms of their live sound during the Tusk tour.

Interesting that they start out using a Mirage tour song order. During the Tusk tour, a basic set was more along the lines of:

Monday Morning
Say You Love Me
The Chain
Dreams
Not That Funny
Rhiannon
Don't Stop
Oh Well
Sara
What Makes You Think You're The One
Over & Over (later in the tour, "Think About Me" was swapped out here)
Save Me A Place (was dropped for "Never Going Back Again" later in the tour, as well)
Landslide
Tusk
Angel
You Make Loving Fun
I'm So Afraid
World Turning
Go Your Own Way
Sisters Of The Moon
Songbird


"Blue Letter" was usually played after "Sisters Of The Moon" during 1st encore, "Songbird" was 2nd encore.

In some ways, yes, but personally, I think they peaked in about August 1977. That was the last of Stevie's tour de force "Rhiannon"s, everybody was clicking on all cylinders. Everybody was still riding the crest of the Rumours wave. By the Tusk tour, I think they were kind of reeling from the discord regarding the record company reaction to the Tusk album and the cracks in stage camaraderie was starting to show publicly (culminating in the "New Zealand fiasco" & Lindsey's almost spilling the beans about the band breaking up that final night at the Hollywood Bowl).

For me, their live shows (the Fireflies, I mean) have taken an ever descending slide since those "hot August nights" of 1977. The newly added energy of Rick & Billy in both '87 & '90 kicked the band back in gear for a couple of tours. But, the energy & cohesiveness when "the five" have been together is sorely lost to the ravages of time (and that pun is unintentional). Even Christine's return, while INCREDIBLE to see & hear her onstage with Fleetwood Mac again, hasn't really brought them back. They've caved to "nostalgia" and really have lost that "fire" I hope they prove me wrong with the new material for the upcoming album...and that the creative process sparks a re-ignition of some of that old fire.

The running order on the CDs is true to the order the songs were performed onstage, the only difference being that they put What Makes You Think... after Landslide (normally, Tusk was played in this place). Shows from very early in the Tusk tour (including the St. Louis show) had a different order, but by December '79, the Mirage tour-style running order was already largely in place (Don't Stop as the 3rd song, followed by Dreams, Oh Well, Rhiannon, etc.) The extended jam version of Not That Funny and the solo acoustic Never Going Back Again were added in early 1980 (Japan & Australia Tusk shows) and were kept in the setlist for the Mirage tour. They didn't make a lot of setlist changes for the Mirage tour, besides adding in a few Mirage songs in place of Tusk songs, adding Brown Eyes & making Second Hand News the opener.

And also, Monday Morning wasn't played until much later in the tour. Say You Love Me was the typical opener instead. And Oh Daddy was replaced with Over & Over later in the tour.

Commenting on the live sound on the Tusk tour, it was epic and really in your face, which is a good thing. What I find most notable about the Tusk tour is how they would just jam on a lot of the songs, World Turning, Chain, Go Your Own Way, and it would never sound the same twice. There was so much improv, also with the way Stevie sang her songs. She never sang them the same way twice, and she improved lyrics and melodies on the drop of a dime. Also Lindsey varied his guitar licks/solos so much from the album version to a point where the song wouldn't be very recognizable. That's a good thing and shows what a great player he is to just come up with those things right on the spot. That's very much a contrast from the present where they sort of seem to be in auto-pilot mode. You can't tell one performance from another as it's so rehearsed now, and nothing is varied anymore concerning vocals and guitar parts.

I thought the same thing about them being place-holder lyrics. But they're a bit too cohesive to be pot luck. This first version of the song seems to be written for John as an ode to forgiveness and friendship, whereas the final version, which switches from from that theme to lust and uncertainty, appears to be for Dennis Wilson. Maybe as the relationship with Dennis progressed, Christine reconceived the song...

This is my problem with them, now. Everything is so scripted and it starts to sound stale...

yes to all of this!

i mean, yes if you never saw / heard ISA live, you will be properly impressed. but if you have, you will be bored by everything being at the exact same place and time, from the guitar licks down to Lindsey's "rocker jumps" done the exact same way at the exact same place on the stage etc etc. it's like a theater play, as Lindsey has been saying lately. no changes, no improvisation, no jazzing up the music.