Monday Morning and Warm Ways as the white album’s first U.S. singles?

[David]

Originally Posted by SteveMacD

The first red flag for me was when he said the album was released In April. It was released on July 11, 1975. “Over My Head” was released in September and the band hired out to get a more radio friendly mix.

Yes, good point, also good point about none of us ever saw an actual U.S. 45. If you say it was a “single,” you need a 45 in the mid-seventies.

Second, in everything we’ve seen in Billboard, the industry rag, none of us has ever seen a mention of any single in 1975 other than “Over My Head.” No DJ who worked for AM pop radio in 1975 has ever reported that he tried to play Mac singles from the new album before “Over My Head.” We’ve just never heard this — and if it were true, it would be publicly true. The most I would buy is that the Reprise label wanted to release those other songs as singles and maybe tested them on a radio audience sample of some sort.

But this brings up another point. Was it common to release a single many weeks after the release of the album in 1975? That in and of itself is odd. The album was surely mastered and in the can by June 1975 if it was available July 11, so why didn’t they release a single at that time? We’re aware that the label had no high hopes for yet another Fleetwood Mac album and all that, but why not release a single promptly? I wish I could go back and read the opening sentences of Samuel Graham’s authorized bio of the band, but I no longer have the book.