It's hard to pinpoint, but I'd say sometime during the 90s Fleetwood Mac stopped being an amorphous entity, and finally froze into something solid and definable. What I mean by that is Fleetwood Mac is restricted to Fleetwood-McVie-McVie-Buckingham-Nicks. The public will accept
one of those members dropping out,
but will not tolerate new additions. So all of this talk about replacing a member is much ado about nothing. They've learned their lesson in regards to replacements. That's why they even cut a show short recently when Mick got sick and had to leave the stage. Yes, they could have gotten the drum tech to step in to finish the show, but they didn't dare. So if Stevie were to quit or get fired- neither of which are going to happen- the band could and probably would continue without her. I don't think that would be a quick process; it might be something like the 6 years in between the Dance and Say You Will. They'd wait to see if Stevie changed her mind, but would move forward without her if it became clear she wasn't interested. Because any way you slice it, you still have 4 members who are most eager to continue to make music. So why the hell shouldn't they?
