Last BTM Concert Review

[aleuzzi]

Originally Posted by michelej1

S

Joel Selvin, Chronicle Staff Critic

LUSH SOUND

The band's sound has grown soft and swollen, what with two additional female background vocalists, an extra percussionist and offstage keyboardist added to the six official band members. There was little focus or unified direction, and even the signature harmony vocals sounded diffuse amid the lush, overflowing torrent of sound. No longer a lean, clean machine, the Mac trundled through the songbook like an aging, corpulent version of itself.

The whole thing is getting too tired for words. Nicks, no longer a young lady with a misty, mournful voice, is having a hard time singing her innocent songs poignant with the irony of youth. "I'm getting older, too," she sang in "Landslide," reaching out and briefly clasping fingers with Christine McVie. Somehow the wrenching realization of years past was all too evident. Shelley Winters would have known better than to try an ingenue role.

Of course, drummer Mick Fleetwood -- along with bassist John McVie, the only original members remaining from the Fleetwood Mac of Peter Green and 1967 -- pledges to continue the tradition, without the two ladies whose vocals made the group one of the most popular bands of the '70s. Just don't be surprised if the next time he comes to town, the band plays Slim's.

Wow, this is pretty bitchy! But I must agree with him about the band's sound being a bit "soft and swollen" at this point in its evolution.