Salon 12-5/2015
http://www.salon.com/2015/12/05/the_...piece_instead/
The genius of “Tusk”: Fleetwood Mac could have followed “Rumours” with more of the same — but they made this visionary masterpiece instead
Fleetwood Mac looked a sure-fire commercial hit in the eye — and made the most punk rock soft rock album ever
PATRICK BERKERY
Evidence exists proving Fleetwood Mac could have followed-up “Rumours” with something similar had the spirit moved them, instead of the alienating departure of the double album called “Tusk” that they did make as the follow-up to one of the most universally appealing albums ever.
When singer-guitarist-producer Lindsey Buckingham wasn’t making like a lo-fi indie rocker from the future playing in Brian Wilson’s sandbox on “Tusk,” Stevie Nicks and Christine McVie were singing songs that sounded like the Fleetwood Mac the world knew and loved — songs like “Sara,” “Think About Me,” “Over and Over,” “Sisters of the Moon,” “Never Forget” and “Angel.”
There’s further evidence sprinkled among the many demos and alternate takes featured on an expansive new “Tusk” box set Rhino Records just released, and unreleased “Tusk”-era tracks out there in the digital ether like Nicks’s “The Dealer,” which she re-recorded for her 2014 solo album “24 Karat Gold: Songs From the Vault.” “That’s Alright,” a beautiful country shuffle dating back to the Buckingham-Nicks days that ended up on 1982’s “Mirage” could have been folded neatly into this batch of songs. Mix those tunes in with some of the least-threatening Lindsey stuff from “Tusk,” like “Save Me a Place,” “I Know I’m Not Wrong” and “That’s Enough for Me” and you’ve got yourself a follow-up that doesn’t stray too far from the “Rumours” formula — one that could be squeezed onto two sides of vinyl as opposed to four by tightening up the fade-outs on a few tunes. Think something along these lines:
Side 1:
I Know I’m Not Wrong
The Dealer
Think About Me
Save Me a Place
Sara
Side 2:
Sisters of the Moo
Over and Over
Angel
That’s Enough For Me
That’s Alright
Never Forget
This “Rumours II” scenario seems commercial enough, with a pretty equitable balance of Stevie’s mystique, Christine’s hopefulness and Lindsey’s intensity. All the familiar pieces are in place: the songs contain the requisite three-part harmonies, plenty of Lindsey’s sick fingerpicking and those hypnotic grooves from Mick Fleetwood and John McVie. And you know co-producers/co-engineers Richard Dashut and Ken Caillat could have dialed in that warm sonic glow they achieved on “Rumours.”
But there’s a significant void. The emotional lightning of two in-house romances simultaneously crumbling, which sparked the fire in “Rumours” songs like “Dreams,” “Go Your Own Way,” “The Chain,” “Never Going Back Again” and “Gold Dust Woman,” couldn’t strike twice. An attempt to repeat the “Rumours” formula without that kind of fire down below would’ve resulted in a hollow imitation. Maybe they sell an extra million or two records in the short term by making the follow-up a single, safer kind of album. Ultimately it would’ve rendered Fleetwood Mac just another big ’70s rock commodity that liked to stick to the script, like the Eagles, Peter Frampton or Boston.
So rather than following the path of least resistance, Fleetwood Mac took the most radical left turn a huge band has ever taken at the peak of its commercial and artistic powers. With Lindsey Buckingham hogging the ball, they spent $1.4 million in 1978-79 dollars making the most punk rock soft rock album ever in “Tusk.” Next to making “Rumours” (and also the band hiring Lindsey and Stevie after Bob Welch left), letting Buckingham take the lead on “Tusk” was the best career move Fleetwood Mac ever made, though it would take years for its impact to be measured accurately.
Once people started recognizing “Tusk” as the enduring masterpiece that it is, it began to serve as a gateway for evaluating Fleetwood Mac from another perspective. It proved there was more to Fleetwood Mac than just “Rumours” and a bunch of other classic rock radio staples; that they weren’t just a pretty cool band you could share with your mom and dad or older brother or sister. “Tusk” showed Fleetwood Mac were also a risk-taking bunch, artists of great depth and integrity. A younger generation of cutting edge artists including Peter Buck, Trent Reznor, Stephin Merritt of Magnetic Fields, Joanna Newsom and Kurt Vile, to name just a handful, have championed the album over the years — Buckingham’s work on it in particular. Other musicians have taken things a step further, by forming groups to cover “Tusk” (and other Mac tunes) live. Mick Fleetwood, in his 1990 autobiography, basically said Fleetwood Mac needed to make “Tusk” if they had any hopes of continuing: “It’s a great album and probably the only reason Fleetwood Mac is still together today … it released a lot of creative frustrations.”
That was not a widely held view when “Tusk” was released in October 1979. To the millions of jilted fans — along with Warner Bros. Records executives and some members of the band — that didn’t hear anything as immediately satisfying as “Dreams” or “Go Your Own Way” among Tusk’s 20 songs, it seemed as if Buckingham had steered this very expensive, high-performing vehicle into a ditch. But time has shown Buckingham steered the band exactly where it needed to go if it hoped to remain relevant in the long term, steering them away from that ’70s FM rock comfort zone into a passing lane where new influences like the Talking Heads and the Clash informed his Elvis/Beach Boys/Everlys roots. As a songwriter, he found a link between David Byrne and Buddy Holly and milked it to manic effect on songs like “Not That Funny” and “The Ledge.” As a producer, he stripped away familiar elements from songs, favoring raw process over the perfection of “Rumours.”