Fan confessions
 

Anyone have any embarrassing fan confessions to share? Whether it's tales of meeting band members,things you didn't used to know about the band that now you can't believe you once didn't know, misheard song lyrics, etc?

Here are some of mine-

Before I became a die hard fan, I didn't know that Christine sang lead on any of the songs. I always thought her songs were sung by Lindsey. I should have been able to figure out it wasn't him by lines like "a poor girl like me", but nope.

I also always thought the band was solely named after Mick since sometimes Mac is a nickname for Mick. I always just thought it was his names flipped.

To this day when I hear Edge of 17, in my head I hear it as "wide winged duck" instead of "white winged dove". It also sounds to me like Stevie's saying "vapor flowers" in Gypsy instead of "paper flowers".

So what are some of yours?

One of my favorite songs is Go Your Own Way. I originally thought the lead singer was Christine.

Before I had become a hardcore fan, I knew Fleetwood Mac had a lot of lineup changes and I was familiar with mostly Rumours singles I would hear on the radio or from my parents, but I didn't know what album it was or year I only knew Stevie Nicks was the singer because I liked her song "sleeping angel" from Fast Times at Ridgemont High. I could tell that there was two female singers because Stevie and Christine's voices sounded different, so I thought since Fleetwood Mac had a bunch of lineup changes that Christine and Stevir were in the band at separate times.

I have a couple of confessions...

1. Although I had heard Fleetwood Mac material in the 70's (thank you to my uncle for having that Rumours album!), when Stevie went solo, I hadn't connected the two! (I was only 14 at the time.). After hearing Stevie's concert radio broadcast, the light bulb went off. I've been a big fan of all members ever since.:)

2. This is more a "Stevie" confession than a FMac confession but here goes - back in the 90's, it was common to buy bootleg cd's of live material out of magazines. One cd I bought really butchered some of the song titles. My favorite was "Stop Dragging My Hearth Around". I was like, "a hearth??? Really? ". Soooooo..... to this day I giggle when I think of the mental image that butchering of the song title gave me of Stevie dragging part of a fireplace around her home. What a way to lose weight in the 90s. :)

I used to listen to Street Angel when I would sneak cigarettes outside of my folks' house in the 90s. I will forever equate filterless Camels with the song Docklands.

That makes me think of her dragging the picture around in the Hold Me video. :)

Ok, here we go:

1. I can't abide the studio version of "I'm So Afraid"

2. "Beautiful Child" is Stevie's weakest song on "Tusk"

3. "Behind The Mask" is better than "Tango In The Night"

4. "Street Angel" is better than "The Other Side Of the Mirror"


:sorry:

1. Yeah, the live version is so much better. I always have a hard time when it comes to voting out songs on the White Album since I love ISA so much, just not that version.

2. Agree. I don't get the love for it.

3. Can't speak to Behind the Mask, but I'm not a Tango fan. Way too 80's for me.

Huzzah!! :xoxo:

I like "Beautiful Child" very much, but it's not the highest moment of the album by a mile.

Again, I do like "Tango" - it has some amazing moments - Big Love, Seven Wonders, Everywhere, Little Lies, Isn't It Midnight. But it mostly falls quite flat for me. Sounds like a bunch of solo songs shoved together rather than a Fleetwood Mac album. And Stevie just wasn't there. Her only 2 self-written tracks are so below the high expectation that she set earlier in her career.

I thought I was the only person who liked Street Angel better than The Other Side of the Mirror. I'm happy to learn I have company.

OSOTM is so poorly produced. The sound is so distorted and muffled, and the drums sound like they were stuck on as an after thought - even on the original vinyl. Songs like "Long Way To Go" and "Whole Lotta Trouble" had the potential to be stomping, rockin' power house tracks, but they fall completely flat thanks to Rupert Hine.

Plus, Street Angel has "Blue Denim", "Love Is Like A River", "Kick It", "Greta", "Street Angel", "Listen To The Rain" and the title track, which I adore.

I like the Behind the Mask Line up and wish they remained that way or at least they had recorded more

I love Welcome To The Room Sara.

I'm probably the only FM fan who absolutely detests the song Songbird.

No, I've seen more hatred of it.

When I first heard "That's All For Everyone" I thought Lindsey was saying "Must Be Just To Sexy, Or Just Me"

I have the misheard song lyrics syndrome with any artist in that matter.Listening to radios with their little 2 inch speakers full blast can make it impossible to catch the words.

http://www.kissthisguy.com/stevie-ni...lyrics-619.htm

Woah, lot of interesting confessions! I've got a few...

- Yes, I thought GYOW and Monday Morning (yes!) were sung by Christine;
- Honey Hi and Beautiful Child are, by far, the worst pieces of Tusk. Even The Ledge and That's Enough For Me are better!
- I don't like Rumours at all. It was THE biggest success of the band, but for me, there's lot of songs from Tusk, FM and Mirage that impressed me more.
- I don't like the accoustic versions. Big Love, Go Insane...
- Fireflies and The Farmer's Daughter are really boring for me.
- I still don't know Christine's solo work.
- And, I didn't like at all In Your Dreams and the last Lindsey albums. Maybe I must listen them a bit more!

Wow, maybe I've got more, but I don't remember now!
Regards!
Mark.

I love Fireflies, but could never latch onto Farmer's Daughter.

Under The Skin took a few years to grow on me. I didn't like it until Gift of Screws came out, and I listened to it again. GoS > UTS.

Christine's solo work - you're not missing a lot. :laugh: In The Meantime is a laidback album - almost too laidback, and the mixing is kind of amateurish. The acoustic version of Friend is great, if you start there. If there's any draw to ITM for me, it's her voice, and it stands out there.

the 80s album... Skip the 1984 concert. :laugh:

That's a confession that should be punishable by death...or at least severe punishment up to & including a NDE by the confessor.

************************************

Should come as no surprise to ANYBODY what my "confession" is

That Lindsey Buckingham's & Stevie Nicks' careers would've began & ended with the Buckingham Nicks album & that they would've said "no thanks" to Mick's offer to join Fleetwood Mac.

Confession: For the most part, I like their mainstream material best. I know that's terribly unhip, hence the "confession" aspect; we're all supposed to declare as our favorites their most inaccessible, obscure material to prove our refined sensibilities far exceed that of the unwashed masses.

Still... give me Rumours over Tusk any day.

I can see why you wouldn't want them to join Fleetwood Mac and make it Rumours Forever, but why would you want their careers to end with the one BN album. Why wouldn't you allow them to go forward, do BN II and have success on their own, unrelated to FM?

Michele

I don't take Rumours over Tusk, but I like mainstream music too. I like POP. If an artist didn't somehow get on Casey Kasem's chart, I would not be likely to know who they were, because if it gets too deep into any one genre it alienates me.

My sensibilities aren't refined and that goes for food too.

Michele

It was 50/50 whether you or David would take the bait on that one. . :xoxo:

I thought all the band's songs were named after women ... or people. At the time i was 7 or 8 and really only knew Sara and Rhiannon :laugh:

I still sing "she was just a witch" in Gypsy ... coz it sounds good :nod:

I don't own nor know of any of Christine's solo stuff

I like Welcome to the Room ... Sara as well :)

When I first read about the band on wiki, before listening to their music, I thought Lindsey Buckingham was a woman and was the lead singer.

No one will ever know what would have happened had Lindsey and Stevie not joined FM. If they had made a second Buckingham Nicks album with Rhiannon included on it and released as a single, it might have broken them through into the US charts just like the song broke FM into the top 20.

My confessions:

- I fail to understand why the performance of Sisters of the Moon in 1982 is so acclaimed by fans, I think it sounds awful.

- I prefer Christine's songs on Tusk to those on Rumours

- Everywhere is one of the bands worst singles

- Family Man is one of Lindsey's best songs

Along those same lines, I fail to understand why people like the Dance dvd version of Silver Springs so much. I actually think the song was much more exciting and charged on the Dance tour than it was in that video and it became interactive and pounding, with Lindsey moving ever closer to Stevie on the tour. In fact, by the end of the tour both Stevie and Lindsey were all the way across the stage as she sang, bumping into poor John.

By contrast, the dynamic between SnL during that dvd version of SS was less interesting to me than watching them on the Mirage video was.

Michele

Nope! I share in your opinion. Songbird makes me want to cut myself and peel my skin off! I never listen to this song, it's always a skip. And if FM closes the show with it this year, at least I will be among the 1st wave out of the parking lot.;)

I thought that too!!! :laugh:

Some more....

1. I do not own a Lindsey Buckingham solo album. I did, but I thought they were crap and they went to the charity shop. I also went to the toilet during "Go Insane" on the unleashed tour.

2. Stevie's solo "Crystal" is better than the version on the white album

3. Anything pre-1975 may as well not have the Fleetwood Mac name on it and anything pre-Bob Welch might as well not exist.

4. I never listen to Lindsey's songs on "Say You Will". They suck.

5. "Bella Donna" and "The Wild Heart" are better than anything Fleetwood Mac released in the 80's.

6. I despise the Tango In The Night Live video. And Stevie's Red Rocks video.

You said toilet and crap under the same number.... lol

I'm with you. It stands out on Tango In The Night as a strong, earthy Rock n Roll song. Lindsey turned something very mediocre into a very commendable highlight of the album. Love it.

Does this even make sense?

I'm hardcore :cool:

Yes.

I quite like a lot of the Bob Welch era stuff, but "quite like" doesn't come close to describing how I feel about the post-75 stuff. You don't sign up to a forum for a band you "quite like".

The pre-Bob Welch, Peter Green blues orientated material doesn't do anything for me at all. I've tried, but alas, I cannot like it.

"Albatross" is possibly the most boring piece of music ever made.

Well if Albatross is the most boring piece of music ever made your musical catalogue must be rather limited...there's something called Oh Well Part 2 for starters!

1. I used to ONLY listen to Stevie's songs when I first discovered the band back in the early 90s. I just didn't find anything notable about the other songwriters... they seemed like typical products of their era. As a contrast with my current views, I think Lindsey's 21st century songs (solo or FM) have more artistic merit to them than Stevie's.
2. Looking at the Rumours artwork as a kid, I wondered if Chris was a man in drag. :laugh:
3. I could probably have been classified as a Stevie/Lindsey "shipper" at one point. These days I find their relationship utterly boring, but the Chris/Dennis Wilson one fascinates me to no end.
4. As a general rule (lots of exceptions), I think Stevie's solo works are pretty banal compared to her Mac contributions.
5. I think Wild Heart is a simply dreadful album.
6. I feel like in some ways, Bob Welch was a better foil for Christine than Lindsey has been. He brought out a lot of greatness in her during the early 70s.
7. I was actually thrilled when the band soldiered on without Christine for the Say You Will era. I was excited about hearing a FM that was less pop oriented, more guitar driven, and seeing what effect that would have on both recorded & live music from Stevie & Lindsey. Turns out Christine was the glue that held those two together, though.
8. I've never really explored blues-era Mac. I love blues music, but it loses pretty much all credibility to me when it's sung by white British dudes.
9. Christine used to be my least favorite member. These days, she's probably my favorite.
10. Though I find Buckingham Nicks to be enjoyable enough & an interesting footnote of Mac history, I couldn't care less if it's ever released in a CD/Digital format. I have even less desire for a Buckingham Nicks reunion tour/album. No thank you.
11. I think Mirage is pretty bad as an album, though it has some pretty epic individual songs.
12. For me, Tango is the 80s version of Rumours- an album created during great upheaval which created nearly perfect pop music. The making of Tango is far more interesting to me than that of Rumours, too.
13. I think Angel (Stevie's version) is just awful, but I adore Only Over You. :shrug:
14. The self-titled '75 album is just too polished for me, which is probably why I love albums like Tusk & Penguin so much more. The warts make an album more interesting to me.
15. That being said, I actually like the album version of I'm So Afraid best- I appreciate how much more musically tight & focused it is vs the live versions which tend to wander.
16. I tend to think Carol Ann Harris' book is generally more credible than Mick's. Ken Caillat's eclipses either in that department, though.

Confessions...

● When Christine left in 1998, I vowed to never to see Fleetwood Mac perform live again, nor to purchase any new music by them, unless Christine returned. I'm finally going to see them again in October!

● I love the version of "Silver Springs" that appears on the b-side of "Go Your Own Way" and on 25 Years - The Chain. I dislike the mix that appears on The Very Best Of Fleetwood Mac and Crystal Visions - The Very Best Of Stevie Nicks.

● I really enjoyed Bella Donna and The Wild Heart. I was so disappointed in Rock A Little that I never bought another solo studio album by Stevie.

● I would be thrilled if "Landslide", "Gold Dust Woman", "Rhiannon", "Go Your Own Way", "I'm So Afraid" and "Big Love" got axed for this year's tour. I'd love for them to be replaced with "Angel" (from Tusk), "That's Alright", "Fireflies", "What Makes You Think You're The One", "Can't Go Back" and "Crystal" (with Lindsey on lead-vocals).

● I didn't mind Lindsey's leaving the band in 1987. I saw the band play that year with Rick Vito and Billy Burnette, and really enjoyed the show. I really liked the Behind The Mask album, and saw the band twice on that tour. I'm happy that Lindsey's back now, though.

● I really like Christine's solo album In The Meantime.

● My all-time favorite Fleetwood Mac song is "Over & Over". Least favorite could be "When I See You Again" (just one notch below "Thoughts On A Grey Day").

This is a very thought-provoking thread!

Behind The Mask was my second album. I tried to convince myself and others of how good it was (but on reflection it wasn't. I must have looked a real dork to my friends). When it was still relatively new to me I played BTM over and over. On a holiday to Lanzarote as a 16 year old I asked the barman in our hotel whether he'd play it in the bar. He switched it off half way through Freedom- I was pretty embarrassed (though I'm surprised he didn't switch it off after the start of In The Back Of My Mind). He didn't say anything to me- he just quietly went to the stereo and pressed stop. The (mostly empty) bar had silence for the next half an hour until somebody put money in the jukebox. It was one of those moments when you immediately ask yourself 'Why the hell did I ever think that would be a good idea? Could the ground now swallow me up please?'.

I just don't get why people like Crystal.

That's All For Everyone- 'Love is just too sexy what I feel that's all'

I've never found Stevie to be tremendously attractive. Very pretty yes but not attractive.

I found 1980's Lindsey quite scary.

I quite like Time.

I gave my wife a Christmas wishlist which included a Fleetwood Mac (White album) CD to replace my copy that I'd lost. I had to feign joy on Christmas day when I opened it to find Fleetwood Mac (Dog/Dustbin- which I already had). It hadn't crossed my mind she'd buy that Fleedwood Mac album.

I again had to feign joy when my wife bought me the Rumours 35th anniversary expanded addition rather than the deluxe box set as I'd been looking forward to.

I find the Lindsey/Stevie relationship schtick on the last couple of tours tedious. To all the ‘shippers’ out there: get over it- it’s made up to help sell tickets.

This is a hilarious anecdote. It reminds me, I had a friend who played in a band and every Tuesday night he would donate his services to a bar for free. He would just get free food and tips from the patrons. Well, after about 2 months the bar's owner told him he couldn't play there any more because of a noise ordinance. So, he stopped, but when he visited the bar a couple of weeks later on Tuesday night, there was another band playing there and he learned the "noise ordinance" excuse was just the owner's polite way of telling him his music wasn't appreciated by the customers.

Also, your wife getting you the wrong items made me laugh. Be very specific on your lists from now on, especially since Warner Bros. has 90 versions of Rumours out there. Oh my goodness, if you ask for the 24 Karat album for Christmas you could get the digital album, the cd, vinyl and who knows what kind of lithograph. You need to spell things OUT!

Michele