Las Vegas 12-31-1995
 

https://youtu.be/o0F5ZSxXqPQ

I had never seen this before. Live footage of this incarnation has always been a bit hard to find and I think the only full show I saw was from France? This was New Year’s Eve 1995 and hard to believe in less than 18 months, The Dance would have already been recorded and about to enter our lives.

This band really isn’t too bad. Bekka’s vocals are really strong and while I’m not exactly a fan of Billy and Dave, they’re a pretty tight band here. The set is pretty diverse but of course is built around the typical standards. Interesting things: is this incarnation responsible for the “falling, falling, falllllllinnnnng” ending to Say You Love Me that so many here hate? I kinda dig this strange version of Gold Dust Woman - it’s just different enough that it doesn’t in any way feel like Bekka is simply covering Stevie. Nearly 15 minutes of World Turning. I suppose better than the 20 minute affairs they had done previously but who the hell has ever told Mick that anyone wants to see this crap? Blue Letter is a nice surprise and fits their voices perfectly. GYOW is impossible for anyone to do justice to IMO and this solo is a bit blah but it isn’t terrible. I wasn’t expecting Not Fade Away toward the end but maybe that was something this band covered and I just never paid attention.

Altogether this really was rather pleasant to watch. I will always prefer the band that reformed the next year and Dave Mason in Fleetwood Mac is forever weird to me, this was definitely a tight unit and Bekka’s vocal abilities are really incredible. It is however hard to reconcile this as Fleetwood Mac without Christine, Stevie, or Lindsey’s voices.

So this version of Fleetwood Mac did technically limp into 1996, then, as they were still performing after midnight. I can recall that Mick pulled the plug on the band shortly after "Time" was released although there was mention of there being a corporate gig they had to do. Oddly, the NYE concert isn't on setlist.com

https://www.setlist.fm/stats/concert...html?year=1995


I can't quite make up my mind about this odd period of Mac history. I like a fair bit of the quixotic "Time" album. However, Mick's assessment in his 2014 book was probably right - "we ended up with a band of talented people playing good music, but they should not have been touring as Fleetwood Mac...we should never have done any of it.....there were too many essential pieces of the machine missing this time."

A tour that included Christine would have been pretty interesting though, although it's completely understandable that she didn't want to do it. Bekka and Dave didn't get on according to Mick's book, and Christine and Dave were not supposed to be best pals either.

Dave MUST be a dick, if neither one of them could get along with him.

This was the first time I ever knew that this band did in fact limp into 1996 - even if only for a few minutes (assuming this was the last gig?). I do think there’s a legitimacy at this point that you really need at least one of the Rumours songwriters in any version of Fleetwood Mac probably as early as 1977. One of Chris, Lindsey, or Stevie really need to be there.

Richard Dashut dropped out of the project because of Dave, too.

Wow. You used to run a Dave Mason board, right?

Why is he such a dick?

It's a real shame that Mick, John and Chris weren't on speaking terms with Bob Welch during this period. Some sort of regrouping involving him could have borne better fruit. I think he offered to replace Lindsey in 1987 but they didn't take him up on the offer.

Frisky group here. Bekka and Bill are so cute together. Did they boff for a time? Dave Mason only gets into any of this on WE JUST DISAGREE, FEELING ALRIGHT, and DEAR MR FANTASY. It’s obvious he has no interest in singing or playing any actual Fleetwood Mac songs. Steve Thoma is whacking the crap out of the ivories as if SAY YOU LOVE ME were BORN TO RUN. These guys were reformed and struggling and should have been acting hungry. Instead, they give you the impression they’re not particularly dedicated to their newish band and they trot out a few Mac songs (six or seven?) in their too-short 90-minute set. I mean, Stevie Nicks played longer than this on her Cocaine a Little tour as a huge star.

There is a whole lotta skill on the stage in the service of blandness. It’s a variety gig from a pickup band. The year after this, folks in the audience probably said to their loved ones: “Remember we saw that strange version of Fleetwood Mac on New Year’s last year?” “Kind of, yeah. Why?” “No reason.”

It was kind of surreal. Die-hard fans who communicated with me said he could be polite, but was generally cold to be around if not an all around ass. Some said he was still using.

He didn’t go to Jim Krueger’s funeral in 1993. At the time, Dave lived in Chicago and Jim in Milwaukee, which is maybe a two hour drive.

John Courage gave me an earful on Dave. He was polite about Bekka and Billy, but had extremely negative things to say about Dave.

Anyway, the more I learned about Dave, the less interested I became in him.

He and Mick did an online chat a year or so ago and it was kind of uncomfortable. Dave was extremely fidgety. Mick said Dave was a perfectionist. I could easily see Christine not digging him.

Bekka and Billy were on again off again. I like that Billy ditched the western attire and mullet. Bekka looked great, too.

Billy knew this was going to be the last show. The body language, especially Dave’s, seems defeated, like they were just going through the motions. Still not a bad show, aside from Steve Thoma overplaying.

Billy certainly looks more handsome here than in other videos I've seen.

Cocaine or heroin?

I loved the Colonel, but he's gone now. Care to share any deets?

Lindsey was the ultimate perfectionist, but Christine loves him... old Dave must put the D back in dick.

Cocaine.

As for anything beyond that, there wasn’t much more to report. It was probably a twenty minute call or so. There was a webmaster spreading misinformation that Bekka, Billy, and Rick were going to be part of the backing band and that it was going to be a 30th Anniversary Tour. JC quickly dispelled that. He also said that the Time band was like a cover band and felt that they had all of these songwriters and should’ve been doing their own songs.

Gotcha. Thanks for sharing the info.

Bekka should have been doing anything but Stevie's songs. She should have done deeper cuts like Spare Me A Little Of Your Love, Why, Just Crazy Love or Warm Ways. Sugar Daddy would have been a fantastic song for her to do.

I've never felt that Dave was a good fit for Fleetwood Mac. He always came across to me as someone who's a "straight-ahead" performer whereas most of the members of the band felt like they could branch out. Besides, if you can't get along with Bekka Bramlett, you must be a giant @$$hole.

Even if things worked out completely with this era of the group, success still would have been limited given the amount of change within the band. I like the Time album but the best thing that happened IMO was it gave Bekka her biggest platform. I wish more people would be able to get past whatever comparisons they thing about a blonde replacing another blonde (or two depending on your point of view.) She's such a fantastic and overlooked talent. She also seems to be an absolute sweetheart of a person who has never seemed to allow whatever negativity came from that period to affect her.

She did like one Stevie song (Gold Dust Woman). The rest were Christine's.

Mick Taylor would have been my choice. He'd just done that album with John and Billy, plus they could've done "Can't You Hear Me Knocking" or "Gimme Shelter," which Bekka could have totally rocked. Plus, yet another ex-Bluesbreaker.

Well, could they fill ANY seats without milking "the hits"? They were out with Pat Benetar and REO Speedwagon. THAT crowd didn't want to hear unknown album cuts(I did, though). The crowd around me bitched incessantly, about how "this isn't FM!"

Bekka is the greatest singer FM ever had. She STILL has pipes to die for. I went and saw her band in Nashville pre Covid, several times, and she was awesome. And stood out in the sidewalk like some commoner on break, smoking her cancer sticks. I asked her about Time, and she acted shocked that I knew about it. The band truly could have had a new horizon, with her as the singer, if they'd only been given the chance.

The one and only time I saw them was fall 1994 (after Stevie’s superb concerts in Northern California at Arco Arena with Rick Vito and Russ Kunkel). Mac was playing Konocti Harbor Spa in Clear Lake, a buffet dinner club with about 200 people eating chicken and rice pilaf at their tables. After dessert was finished, you turned your chair toward the small stage at one end of the room — and there was Fleetwood Mac. Not exactly auspicious.

They played essentially the same set (five or six Mac hits and several Mason numbers, just over an hour) with the same confused listlessness and flippancy. Afterwards, I went out on the boat dock and talked to Mick Fleetwood, who was smoking a cigarette and staring out over the dark water.

It didn’t really matter who was in the band at this point. The band had no focus, no raison d’être. It was as if their arrest warrant and death sentence had already been signed, not only by their label but the public, as well. They had sunk to the level of a side dish with your chicken and rice.

I had lawn seats, and the people around me were bitching incessantly, "this isn't Fleetwood Mac!"

I think this is what Lindsey called the “steakhouse circuit” during that MTV interview for The Dance. “Next stop, Palookaville!” :laugh:

Could they though? They’d have to totally disassociate themselves with the Rumours era of the band and there’s no way that was going to happen at that point. Even if the Time album had been pushed, how could they reasonably tour it effectively with Christine on the album but not on the road? And by the time we’re talking about, with Hell Freezes Over still making obscene amounts of money, no doubt that any restart of Fleetwood Mac was going to be to reset it back to the 1975-87 era.

If they were willing to forego commercial success, there was the alt.country/No Depression/Americana movement that was growing. They could have carved out a niche in that, especially if they’d replaced Dave Mason with Mick Taylor, who was part of the Rolling Stones’ country-rock era. Maybe they could’ve gotten signed to an indie label like Matador, but I absolutely think they could have redefined the band.

However, that would have required leaving an insane amount of money on the table. I don’t think Mick or John would have been willing to do that, and it would be hard to blame them, since it’s the same amount of work either way.

Though the original rhythm section is there, the total absence of the three singers, who probably were the main reason for many people in the late 70s to become Fleetwood Mac fans, makes people (and media, record companies, etc.) not interested in this lineup.

Bekka had a great voice there. But, with all respect, this sounds like a tribute band to me.

Yeah. Its tough when famous singers front your band and the drummer/bassist are original and want to go on. Mick has looked back and written regret making the band go on. However you must put it in context. Fleetwood Mac was over and you keep doing what you want to do to keep you busy and make a few bucks. Your other option is to sit home and think of older days. Part of me admires the effort to keep the band relevant. There is that other part that makes you realize you need to stop. For those that flame them for doing classic Mac songs.......this line up needed to. No one was coming to hear songs from Time, an album they never heard of. Some of them realized the singers had changed but they still want to hear those songs. In 1994 I had a chance to see them up close at a nightclub and I passed. You know what, I have regret about that.

So, I was looking at the page dedicated to the OOTC tour and noticed something curious: The first leg of the OOTC tour ended around the same time Billy quit Fleetwood Mac, maybe within a week of each other in April, 1993.

Now I’m wondering how the Time band was even allowed to exist. Why the label didn’t intervene and why Lindsey didn’t reach out is curious. By that point, Warner’s and Lindsey knew he wasn’t viable as a solo artist and it should have been obvious, especially after the inauguration, that a new version of Fleetwood Mac fronted by people who weren’t on Rumours wasn’t going to be viable.

I don’t get how Lindsey could stand by and watch a brand he helped build get dragged through the mud, unless it was a matter of letting them humiliate themselves so he could be a white savior. Ironically, his bassist left the tour after the first leg, so there was even a perfect opening for some type reunion or offshoot. The whole debacle is as much on Mo Ostin, Lenny Waronker, and Lindsey Buckingham as it’s on Mick Fleetwood and John McVie, IMO.

Well I think we’ve all said here many times that this group of people are relatively terrible businesspeople. There are so many instances of missed opportunities that it’s unfathomable they’ve been as successful as they are. It’s as if their success is in spite of their own best efforts to self-sabotage.

Wouldn't that be something if they all knew the reunion, in some way shape or form, was coming. I'll give you this much, there are some clues.

I am sure they were offered deals but clearly were not ready and rejected them. I dont buy the conspiracy theories because Lindey's solo tour ended the same month as Billy leaving the band? But then Billy came back to the band. With all the fuss over the inaugural the band put out countless statements they were NOT getting back together and it was a one time gig. Lindsey could see the shape Stevie was in 1993 and still wanted no part the madness. Chris did not even want to record Time and had to be forced to do it. I believe no serious talk of a reunion happened until at least 1996 when everyone hit rock bottom. Time flopped and the band saw they could not go on, Stevie almost quit performing, Chris left and wanted out of CA and go back to England. Her house was just finished since renovations started in 1990.

Billy left Fleetwood Mac sometime in late-March/early-April, 1993 to resume his country career. The last show of the first leg of the OOTC tour was April 10, 1993.

Lindsey knew by then that his creative vision that he saw come to fruition wasn’t connecting and wasn’t viable. Similarly, the label should have known a new version of Fleetwood Mac fronted by people who weren’t on Rumours wasn’t going to be viable.

At that point Fleetwood Mac should have been shelved indefinitely and Lindsey, Mick, and John should have formed an offshoot, allowing them to record music and tour that would be credible and more viable than the alternatives, while keeping the door open for a full Fleetwood Mac reunion.

Didn't the 4 of them start working together late 1996 and then they called Stephanie?

This is key to me. Until he opted to work with her in 1996, after she had really cleaned up, he would not have tolerated her. She didn’t even attend the Clinton press conference. She was still Miss Flighty.

The idea that a huge payday in the wake of his commercial solo failure would have pulled him back in is not something I agree with. He obviously was disappointed in the low sales for Cradle, but he was resolved to continue working solo. Even with Mick and John working with him in 1995, that was still a solo album in the making. It wasn’t intended as a Mac project. They were busy at the time playing little gigs (and possibly operating in the red). Mick was trying to make a go of his latest configuration, at least for a time in 1995.

I think what brought Stevie back into the fold was her series of concerts in 1996 and her proposed Lifetime cable concert special (which was ultimately canceled). I think those concerts rejuvenated her and made her possibly think that she would want to join Mac again — still iffy.

However, it’s not like it had to be an either-or proposition. There was a middle option. Hypothetically, something like Buckingham Fleetwood McVie would have been more viable than Lindsey on his own or Mick and John putting together a new Fleetwood Mac and would have kept the door open for a full Fleetwood Mac reunion.

This is why the label should have intervened, which they eventually did after Mo and Lenny left in August, 1994 when they stuck Rob Cavallo on Lindsey, who in turn stuck Mick on Lindsey. If the label had intervened in April, 1993, we would have been spared the Time lineup and two years of Lindsey sulking.

How does "Twisted" fit into the chronology?

Well, Mick was announced as part of Lindsey’s new album in late February/early March, 1996. The dissolution of Fleetwood Mac was officially announced in April, 1996 (Dave Mason’s bass player told me on March 31, 1996).

We knew in April that Stevie and Lindsey had a new song coming out for the “Twister” soundtrack.

Mick, John, Christine, and Stevie were at the Kentucky Derby on the weekend of May 4, with (ironically) Steve Winwood filling in for Lindsey Buckingham.

Twister came out on May 10.

As for the song, Mick was on drums and Federico Pol was on bass, so it was before John was involved. I’m guessing it was recorded in February, 1996.