story about Christine leaving FM (told by SN yesterday)
 

i listened to the recording of SN's Q&A from yesterday at Hamptons before her movie premiere - here's the more/less faithfully transcribed part about Christine leaving the band:

Chris started to get panic attacks in the last couple of years
course she didn't wanna fly
and when you tour like FM tours we the band can't go on the bus
b/c we'd be too tired to go on stage
so she got really afraid of flying
and she's been doing this since she was 14
i mean i started you know in my 20s
so since she's 14 she'd been in a band
and after The Dance we went to Grammys
and it wasn't we didn't win the grammy -
which we wanted to win really a lot for The Dance
and Lindsey got kinda mad
and she wasn't really happy with that situation
and basically when it was all over and everybody had gone home
she and i were doing some preps
she said to me "i quit"
and i'm and i was and i looked at her "really??"
because we had done 40 shows, in US,
we could have done you know 2 months in Australia, couple of months in Europe, we could have toured the whole world
we could have been out another year
and which would have been multi-million dollars
and, so i said "really??"
and she said "really."
and look in her eyes was like when somebody breaks up with you
and you know they are not kidding
and you know there are no reason for you to go but
so i said so you're done? and she said "i'm done."
and i said "well, who's telling them, me or you?"
and she said "no i'll tell them"
so band basically broke up
for until... until... until we went back together to do Say You Will
we, we really had to think for several many years whether or not we were gonna continue without her
or if we could
and i think the only reason that we could continue without her
was because the stage itself still looked very similar
because you have crazy Mick in the middle and Lindsey here
and me here and John here and the only thing was missing was Chris
who never wanted to be in the spotlight anyway
so she was way over on the side behind her big huge organ
and that's how she wanted it
she wanted... Chris always wanted to be one of the musicians
she never had any want to ever walk upfront and be center stage
so because of that
we could pretty much replicate the show without her
otherwise we wouldn't have been able to to continue."

Thanks for that. I was very curious.

Michele

Pretty much replicate the show? My ass.

Replicate the keyboards, sure. Replicate her voice, on her(and their) songs? Get outta here!:mad:
Never the same. I wish they'd pull the plug, and stick to their solo projects.

:laugh: you know, i was listening to that and thinking - really? it's ALL about how it looks [on the stage]? not how it sounds?? some strange thinking for a musician. :shrug:

Wow, Stevie was on a roll for this interview. Lindsey is grumpy and in love with her forever, and Christine McVie was only a visual addition to the band, and not even a noticeable one.

Well, she's not a musician. Michele

how do you mean? :confused:

didn't she give advice to any budding musicians during that q&a yesterday how there's no reason to learn guitar or piano b/c look how good she's doing with just barely knowing several chords. :p :thumbsup:

Her advise obviously makes no sense for just regular musicians. However, it has pertinence to songwriters certainly. It's not about how much you know but how you use what you do know.

i think she didn't mean to say what actually came out.

she was probably trying to say something that lindsey always says - how he never learned to play guitar in a proper way or to read music, but that helped him to be more inventive b/c he knew of no rules to follow.

i'm not sure that it helps anybody - musicians or songwriters - if someone says to them something like "no reason to learn anything":shrug: - which is what she basically said. what she probably meant to say was something like "just follow your instincts". but who knows, i'm not good at stevie-speak or looking at the world through chiffon ;):p. a lot of what she says sounds kinda oblivious and out-of-touch to me.

love it when you talk lindsey-speak to me! :thumbsup:

Tried to translate best I could. :angel:

isn't that weird??? lol

Thanks for this. I'm not surprised by any of the information except that both Christine and Lindsey were upset for not winning the grammy. Well, I say, you should've put together a package that wasn't 95% nostalgia--largely for a grammy you won in 1977. As good as it was to see the band do that TV concert and as fine as it was to hear them sing those songs again, the best moments of that recording are when they break new ground: the four new songs intrigued me, as did the re-arrangements of "Big Love" and "Say You Love Me." "Silver Springs" is an outstanding re-interpretation of the original. The rest is pretty much re-treading very old, tired ground.

I was annoyed that James Taylor won the grammy that year. His album was likewise the same old thing. Paula Cole (remember her?) should have won for This Fire.

When the Rumours line-up reconvened in 1997, they could have done it right. Instead, they chose to make big, comparatively easy money. No innovation. I was thrilled to see them again, but I admire SYW and ITM far more than that recording. And kudos for Stevie for the new (ish) album, since it shows her growth as a performer and composer.

But when they *did* do something new (Say You Will), they didn't even get a nomination. The Dance was perfect for getting the Grammy, and came as close as anything FM had done since Rumours.

Because it basically was Rumours.

This is really interesting. I read the first part as Chris being mad / exasperated at LB for being angry about the Grammy!

I do think, as usual, the timeline is a bit skewed. Or maybe this is the true version of events. I recall various times Stevie saying that Chris decided she was quitting about half way through the Dance tour. Then there was another story in which they were told towards the end of the tour and that by the Brits and Grammys Chris was quite happy because she was really just fulfilling some final obligations, having decided that she was finished with FM.

You're very probably right.

Again, as fun and rewarding as The Dance was, it was not a grammy-worthy album, IMO. It was simply too nostalgic. SYW, on the other hand, deserved a grammy nod.

If my reading of what Stevie says is right, and Christine got sick of Lindsey's attitude, the way he talked about her for the SYW promo stuff makes a little more sense.

I can't see Christine getting so angry about not winning a Grammy that it would tip her over the edge and make her quit. Clearly, as we know, there were other touring-related issues, but it seems to me that there may have been personal conflicts about which little has been said.

Eh, I think she was done. She just wanted to go out on a high note. Her songs on "Time" made it clear she was done then. She had already retired from the road five years before "Time" as it was. "The Dance" was a miracle in terms of getting her back in the band and out on the road. It really wasn't a shocker that she was the one to call it quits.

Yes but I just meant within the context of the Dance project. From what we have heard, the possibility of Christine doing another leg might have been quite real had things not become so tricky during the first forty dates...

I think there were personal conflicts too. And, if you watch The Dance rehearsal videos, when Christine was asked if they all got together to talk things out prior and she said no they didn't talk and Lindsey whispered in Stevie's ear, "we're still not talking" and Stevie snickered; it was obvious there was something going on then between them.

Also, I've said this before and I'll reiterate it in this forum -- Stevie & the band knew before The Grammys that Christine was not returning. Stevie is doing a little bit of a dance in this recent interview, but there was a video interview -- I believe it was backstage at The Grammys even -- and Stevie stated then that Christine was retiring, that they were sad about it, but they wanted her to be happy, but they would be doing another album without her anyway within the next few years.

I think everything Stevie said happened, but she wrapped it around The Grammys and it was misleading -- maybe intentionally in order to muddy the waters a bit:

and after The Dance we went to Grammys -- yep they did
and it wasn't we didn't win the grammy - -- so what she is leading up to is not about The Grammys
which we wanted to win really a lot for The Dance -- sure they did, ok , but listen...
and Lindsey got kinda mad -- about something she didn't specifiy...
and she wasn't really happy with that situation -- oops... Christine was not happy with the "situation", that wasn't about not winning the Grammy
and basically when it was all over and everybody had gone home -- a fight maybe? that must have happened before the Grammys because at the Grammys she knew already that Chris was retiring...
she and i were doing some preps
she said to me "i quit"
and i'm and i was and i looked at her "really??" -- sounds like a fight and Christine quit.

I think it could be interpreted either way, but I see it as Christine being unhappy about not getting the Grammy.

I'm not sure it's fair to parse Stevie's off-the-cuff dialogue line-by-line as if it were very deliberately structured and carefully phrased. Sitting in my seat at the talk, I did NOT get the feeling that she was saying that Christine left because Lindsey got pissy about something. There was a reason she talked about it in context of the Grammys, and all the different (non-Lindsey) issues that led up to it. I definitely did not hear it as her trying to blame Christine's leaving on Lindsey.

There's enough clear-cut SnL drama without us going through her talk with a fine-toothed comb in order to find more.

She talks a lot. Most of the time people don't listen to what she is really saying. Wasn't trying to find more drama - I don't think it's hard to do though. LOL.

But, she specifically said, "it WASN'T that we didn't win the Grammy".

Agreed, - it could be interpreted other ways.

I heard it more as if, she started to say something else (like "We went to the Grammy's and it wasn't what we expected," or something of that nature) and then changed her trajectory.

"After The Dance we went to Grammys and it wasn't.... We didn't win the Grammy, which we wanted to win really a lot for The Dance, and Lindsey got kinda mad and she wasn't really happy with that situation."

Yeah, that's why we have to be careful about inserting words like "that" which weren't actually there.

^I really wanted to throw in the Bob Dylan joke here but couldn't come up with one that would work... ;)

So, where was "that" added?

Between "wasn't" and "we."

"It wasn't that we didn't win the Grammy" vs "It wasn't - we didn't win the Grammy"

just to clarify since i was the one who transcribed what i heard on Amlyn's recording (thanks for sharing Amlyn! :wavey: ) -

i tried to capture everything that SN said b/c i didn't feel like cleaning it up - so most of "you knows" and little verbal stumblings are captured. so when listening to this part -

and after The Dance we went to Grammys
and it wasn't we didn't win the grammy -
which we wanted to win really a lot for The Dance

the bolded part sounded basically like a bit of verbal stumbling / looking for the best way to word her thoughts, like people always do when talking off the cuff. you know - maybe something like "it wasn't happening" and then she decided to go for different wording and just clearly state "we didn't win it". i could have probably just as easily skip that "it wasn't" or put something like "it wasn't.... we didn't... win the grammy".

this part:

and Lindsey got kinda mad
and she wasn't really happy with that situation

the way i heard it, it could be interpreted in at least 2 different ways -

• listing that both LB and CM were unhappy about grammys - Lindsey got mad, Christine was unhappy with not getting grammy and similar situations happening to FM; or -
• LB got mad, and CM was fed up dealing with that kind of behavior.

i'm not sure which one Stevie meant to imply, which one is the truth, or whether it even happened around the grammys.

considering sodascouts was there, i will go with her interpretation as probably the closest to what was meant, since she could get all little body language and expressions that i couldn't see on the audio recording, and that we can even less get from my transcript.

yup, everybody adds a word here or there to go with their interpretation... and you get that good old telephone game effect. :nod:

Thanks for clarifying your transcript elle. I rewatched the video. And, I still hear what Stevie was saying as closer to the "b" scenario. The way she said it was more of a recounting of events to me that happened around the time of the Grammys:

1. We went to the Grammys
2. We didn't win the Grammy
3. Lindsey got mad
4. Christine was not happy with the situation

I also appreciate Nancy's perspective and realize it could be as simple as nothing. It's just my personal opinion (based on the other two points in my previous post and other things I've heard) that it was more serious than not winning a Grammy and I hardly think Christine would have turned down the offer to make the extra millions Stevie described in a world tour just because she was having a little anxiety that could have been treated. Again though, just my opinion. :)

What, exactly, are the other things you've heard?

^Just that there was other issues that led to her decision related to disagreements I guess with Lindsey and maybe Stevie. It was speculation, I guess (?), but when Stevie made those comments in the way she did, along with the other observations I made- it stood out.

musical disagreements? or some kind of private / personal issues disagreements?

Don't have specifics.... just she was fed up with the drama? I would guess if that's true it was just the other things of course, but she probably would have done the world tour thing anyway- if there hadn't been a straw that broke the camel's back.