As Long As You Follow (video)
 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ROGEHq1WZqU

I sat and watched this as I drank my morning coffee. It still touches me how amazing this video is. Reminds me of Christmas, too.

In my mind, ALAYF and Love Shines are sister songs, and both should have been BIG hits. Classic Christine(not to be confused with Oh Daddy or Warm Ways).

Heart of Stone is also a great song. Not sure what that has to do with Oh Daddy and Warm Ways. (haha just kidding) It has to do with you being obsessed with berating beautiful songs. Isn't that weird? :xoxo:

It does remind me of Christmas because it was released around Christmas. I was shocked it was not a big hit. I thought the world was waiting to hear what the "new" Mac sounded like but I was wrong. The Greatest Hits album is one of their biggest sellers especially that Xmas but the song could not get airplay to save its life. Of all the crappy songs released in 1988 this definitely was not one of them. But it was a premonition of sorts because by the time their new album was released 1.5 years later, Chris's lead single barely charted at all. Although it went to #7 in Canada. This is why Canadians are so cool.
Even worse, I was pulling out my hair that MTV NEVER played the freaking video. Not once. You had to tune into loser VH1 to see it. Why? MTV was playing all sorts of adult contemporary Whitney Houston songs yet Fleetwood Mac was bad for MTV? Disgraceful!

Sometimes I feel ALAYF was the last GREAT song from Fleetwood Mac, even though Lindsey was not there.

I always think how would it have sounded if Lindsey had been involved in the production, but frankly I don't miss him in this song.

I agree. I can’t say that about any other song that he wasn’t involved with after Tango but this is a masterpiece as it is. Great song!

I think you’re right. It really is the last great Mac song. There are some good songs on all of the albums since, but ALAYF stands with any other song from the band’s catalog and is one of Christine’s best. I don’t know what Lindsey could have done to improve it but it’s perfect just how it is.

It does my heart good to see As Long As you Follow get some love here. Totally underrated masterpiece. I think a thesis could be written on why or how this song wasn’t a bigger hit- the state of radio at the time, the grunge era just starting, not being played by MTV, etc. One thing I’ve noticed is that most casual FM fans- people who only bought the Greatest Hits album, for example, think ALAYF was a big hit, because it’s on the Greatest Hits album.

If FM had ever bothered to play the song live, I think they would have been shocked at the audience reception, because most people would have known the song quite well. If only they had performed it during the Behind the Mask tour, but I’m sure they saw no point because it wasn’t a smash like Little Lies or Everywhere, which is a shame. It would have been interesting seeing Lindsey perform it with them when he returned, but no way was he going to play on a song he wasn’t around for, which I kind of understand. But the last tour would have benefitted from featuring this song instead of All Over Again.

I think the changing of the guard pushed this song down a bit. I agree it's a masterpiece.

I remember that The video for 'ALAYF' was played on MuchMusic (a Canadian version of MTV), so maybe that's why it charted better in Canada. Videos were a must back then.

The video for 'Everywhere' (and for 'Whole Lotta Trouble' if I recall correctly) got some rotation here too, which I heard was mostly ignored by MTV.

Yes, I was a crazed Mac fan in 1987 and watched MTV every hour waiting for the new Mac single Everywhere but never saw it. I never saw the video until decades later on Youtube. I actually never thought a video existed. MTV abandoned the Mac for Everywhere, As Long As You Follow, and Skies the Limit. But they played the hell out of Save Me. It drove me nuts because MTV played tons of adult contemporary artists back then but took the Mac out of rotation.
You are correct, MTV played the hell out of Rooms on Fire but never played Whole Lotta Trouble.

I don’t even think VH-1 played Everywhere. Or Whole Lotta Trouble or Paper Doll, for that matter. Whole Lotta Trouble was a bomb as a single, and the horns on the song probably made it difficult to classify. Everywhere didn’t feature the band, so I got why MTV and VH-1 didn’t play it. I understand the band was smack in the middle of a tour, but what a wasted opportunity to not introduce Billy and Rick to the audience by featuring them in the video. The Paper Doll video recycled footage of previous FM videos, hardly must see tv. Plus the single was a bomb, anyway.

The video for As Long As You Follow is beautifully shot, and they all look lovely. Christine especially looked beautiful. I think the video was interesting- didn’t it focus on three different couples at an apartment building in various stages in their relationships? Two of the women leave their relationships and happen to meet at the elevator, but then the younger woman changes her mind and returns.

The Tango concert video of Everywhere should have been the video. I remember watching the MTV news in 1987 and they were covering the Mac tour. The VJ said they had a feeling the next Mac video is going to feature lots of live footage since the band is in the midst of a giant tour. It happened but was never officially released as the video which is a shame.

MTV played all sort of videos from songs that were not hits from not so known bands and major bands. Why they ignored the Mac and Stevie during this time from their lesser known stuff is a mystery. It was not cool to be into Fleetwood Mac in 1988.

Because No Lindsey Buckingham IMO.

I think I discovered the Everywhere video in YouTube, too.

Back to the topic, does anybody know any info about the ALAYF video? How did they define the concept, location, who the actors were, anything?