lindsey-article

shackin'up · #1 09-28-2006, 01:52 PM

Via LB.com:

http://www.timeoutny.com/newyork/Det...is_own_way.xml

Gone his own way

Who’s that strange new folkie? It’s Lindsey Buckingham, the brain of Fleetwood Mac.

By Jay Ruttenberg

“Reading the paper, saw a review,” Lindsey Buckingham sings at the outset of his new album, Under the Skin. “Said I was a visionary, but nobody knew.” The song ends on a punch line—“You should never believe what you read”—but its reviewer actually makes a valid argument. Despite his membership in Fleetwood Mac, Buckingham himself has long been accorded the status of a cult artist: beloved by music nerds, but a shadow next to the band’s iconic singer, Stevie Nicks.

Considering that Fleetwood Mac has sold more than 100 million records, this is a strange oversight. After all, Buckingham wasn’t just some backroom knob-twister! He was the guitarist with the bushy Afro and perennially exposed chest hair, one of the quintet’s three dynamite singer-songwriters, and the production wizard behind the hazy soft rock that came to symbolize ’70s Los Angeles. Most critically, he was the man who broke Nicks’s heart—or was it the other way around?—giving birth to the notion of rock band as soap opera, as well as 1977’s megaselling Rumours.

That album will always define Fleetwood Mac. Yet Buckingham’s own legacy may rest with a different work: Tusk, the sprawling, marching-band-adorned follow-up to Rumours, a sort of Paul’s Boutique or Kid A of its day. “Can you imagine us delivering that album to the record company?” asks Buckingham, 58, speaking from L.A. after putting his kids on the school bus. “Even within the band it was difficult for me. [Drummer] Mick Fleetwood will now say that Tusk is his favorite album—but that took a long time. After it came out and wasn’t a 16-million-copy seller, there were politics within the band that said we weren’t going to make records like it anymore. I probably never would have made solo albums had there not been that limitation.”

Flash-forward a few decades, and Buckingham remains on the path paved by Tusk. Recorded mostly in hotel rooms while the singer was on a Fleetwood Mac reunion tour, Under the Skin is intimate and spare, with masterful acoustic picking and percussion consisting of Buckingham beating on a chair. “Hopefully it’s only a step above sitting in the living room playing guitar for somebody,” he says. “I was trying to return to my center, which is the folk medium.” Ironically, in reaching back to old folkies, Buckingham has achieved a sound that’s very much in accordance with contemporary West Coast artists like Joanna Newsom and Devendra Banhart; even without trying, this guy has an ear tuned to his era.

Skin is Buckingham’s first solo album since 1992, the year Bill Clinton borrowed Fleetwood Mac’s “Don’t Stop” as his campaign anthem. These two events are not unrelated. Buckingham, who had angrily left the band in ’87, rejoined when they were summoned to perform at Clinton’s inaugural gala. Ever since, the guitarist has had a boomerang relationship with the group reminiscent of Michael Corleone’s bond to the mafia. “It’s like a black hole that pulls me in,” he says. Before the quintet’s ’97 reunion, “we had dinner at [singer] Christine McVie’s house. Everyone literally stood around me in a circle, as if it was an intervention, saying, ‘We’ve got to do this!’ But these are people that I love—I don’t take it lightly.”

The handsome, late-summer mistiness of Skin is a far cry from Fleetwood Mac’s rote reunion material, and Buckingham doesn’t hesitate to say which lies closer to his heart. But he also credits his return to the group with allowing him to grasp his past and arrive at his current work. “It took a long time for me to get over many things,” Buckingham says. “I think it took a long time for me to get over Stevie. It took time for me to come to terms with this huge success we had, which in my mind didn’t seem connected to anything that we were doing. But I’m a family member now and can be friends with the band in a way that I never was before. I’ve come to a point where I’m refining my craft—it doesn’t feel like I’m marking time or sliding down. It feels like an ongoing process of growth.”

shackin'up · #2 09-28-2006, 01:53 PM

I wish he spoke more about the content of this album, but hey! THERE'S LINDSEY IN THE MEDIA!!!!!

gypsysoul · #3 09-28-2006, 02:00 PM

Good article. I especially like the Michael Corleone analogy!

MacMan · #4 09-28-2006, 02:10 PM

Here's the pic from the article:

DownOnRodeo · #5 09-28-2006, 04:51 PM

I can imagine Stevie looking at that pic:

"Pff! Sleeping with his guitar again. Men never change!'

danax6 · #6 09-28-2006, 05:00 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MacMan

Here's the pic from the article:

Oh my, come to mama.

shackin'up · #7 09-28-2006, 05:04 PM

This side of the Ledge is getting hornier in some way...

chiliD · #8 09-28-2006, 05:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by shackin'up

"...I probably never would have made solo albums had there not been that limitation.”

DAMN YOU, MICK FLEETWOOD!!!!!

Just think of the Fleetwood Mac albums that never were. I've been BLAMING both Lindsey & Stevie for that all these years. And, now I discover it was Mick Fleetwood's own fault!

{in Kyle Broslawski's voice} YOU BASTARD!!!!

foxyluva · #9 09-28-2006, 05:16 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by chiliD

DAMN YOU, MICK FLEETWOOD!!!!!

Just think of the Fleetwood Mac albums that never were. I've been BLAMING both Lindsey & Stevie for that all these years. And, now I discover it was Mick Fleetwood's own fault!

Of course it was Mick! Im sure Lindsey would have wanted to make more Tusks if he was allowed to - Mick had control of everything in the band.

I love this article btw

shackin'up · #10 09-28-2006, 05:21 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by chiliD

DAMN YOU, MICK FLEETWOOD!!!!!

Just think of the Fleetwood Mac albums that never were. I've been BLAMING both Lindsey & Stevie for that all these years. And, now I discover it was Mick Fleetwood's own fault!

{in Kyle Broslawski's voice} YOU BASTARD!!!!

Tusk is the best album ever recorded. This quote and lindseys lyrics to Not Too Late put things in perspective. I finally get stated what I've always thought.

On the other hand, Lindseys problems with his bandmates addictions and their (non)-artistic effects, played a role too, ofcourse.

BTW: How cynical are you in this quote, Steve?

shackin'up · #11 09-28-2006, 05:26 PM

....but Belladonna moon at BNnet transcripted this unbelievable vulnerable, open lyric-not whiny at all- that really teared me up, from Not Too Late:

Not Too Late

reading the paper
saw a review
said I was a visionary
but nobody knew

now that's been a problem
feeling unseen
just like I'm livin'
somebody's dream

(chorus)
what am I doin' anyway
telling myself it's not too late
I'm not a young man
but I'm a child in my soul
I feel there's room for
a man who is whole
and there's a need
for songs that are sung
the chances not taken
for deeds not yet done

what am I doin' anyway
telling myself it's not too late
my children look away
they don't know what to say

so that's been a problem
feeling unheard
so called visions
always deferred
it must be the reason
I developed this need
and you should never
believe what you read

repeat chorus

chiliD · #12 09-28-2006, 05:27 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by shackin'up

BTW: How cynical are you in this quote, Steve?

Well, considering the fact that the rest of Fleetwood Mac "punished" Lindsey for Tusk, and considering that was one of the factors that led to Lindsey STARTING a solo career and taking more time AWAY from Fleetwood Mac, not cynical at all. If Lindsey was left to being Lindsey WITHIN Fleetwood Mac, just think of how many MORE albums Fleetwood Mac would've/could've released in the '80s & '90s.

Now, "sarcastic", yeah, it was dripping with that.

shackin'up · #13 09-28-2006, 05:31 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by chiliD

Well, considering the fact that the rest of Fleetwood Mac "punished" Lindsey for Tusk, and considering that was one of the factors that led to Lindsey STARTING a solo career and taking more time AWAY from Fleetwood Mac, not cynical at all. If Lindsey was left to being Lindsey WITHIN Fleetwood Mac, just think of how many MORE albums Fleetwood Mac would've/could've released in the '80s & '90s.

Now, "sarcastic", yeah, it was dripping with that.

Well I agree with you. Even with the sarcasm. Painful isn't it?

Lets celebrate UTS in his artistic honor the next few days.

PS: How's SUD doing in the Chilibowl?

Peestie · #14 09-28-2006, 05:39 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by chiliD

Well, considering the fact that the rest of Fleetwood Mac "punished" Lindsey for Tusk, and considering that was one of the factors that led to Lindsey STARTING a solo career and taking more time AWAY from Fleetwood Mac, not cynical at all. If Lindsey was left to being Lindsey WITHIN Fleetwood Mac, just think of how many MORE albums Fleetwood Mac would've/could've released in the '80s & '90s.

Now, "sarcastic", yeah, it was dripping with that.

Very frustrating

If there had been less focus on sales and more on music we could have loads on Mac albums in the 80's (instead of a mighty 2...) and if they'd stayed together would could have had them all last decade as well!

To echo Chilli "YOU BASTARD!!!!" Mick!

Sahara · #15 09-28-2006, 05:39 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by MacMan

Here's the pic from the article:

Mmmmh ... *drooly* NICE.