Fleetwood Mac
The whole world listened together to the sound of five people falling in love and falling apart.
At a glance 🔭💭
Some coordinates adapted from GeoNames (CC BY 4.0) · Pleiades (CC BY 3.0)
Members and collaborators ⏳🌊
- MemberPeter Green
As a founding guitarist, he shaped the band's early blues sound.
- MemberMick Fleetwood
Drummer and leader who lent half the band's name.
- MemberJohn McVie
Bassist and the other half of the band's name.
- MemberChristine McVie
A composer who added soft melody to the band through keyboards and vocals.
- MemberStevie Nicks
A vocalist who joined in 1975 and transformed the band's sound into something distinctly American.
- MemberLindsey Buckingham
The member who handled guitar and production, shaping the band's golden age.
I. The Blues Boys of London · 1967
(Formation) The band formed in 1967 in London, England. When guitarist Peter Green left John Mayall's Bluesbreakers to start his own band, he tried to recruit drummer Mick Fleetwood and bassist John McVie. When McVie didn't readily agree, Green went ahead and named the band 'Fleetwood Mac' anyway, hanging the two men's surnames on it — the name came first, the people filled in later. (Background) Fleetwood was born in 1947 in Redruth, Cornwall, England, and grew up moving from place to place, while McVie was born in 1945 in London and was drawn to jazz and blues bass from an early age. Both had played alongside Green in Mayall's band, developing a rapport. To this core was added nineteen-year-old Jeremy Spencer, who was obsessed with Elmore James's slide guitar (a technique of sliding a bottleneck or metal tube along the strings to bend notes together), rounding the lineup out to four. (Name) McVie eventually gave up the steady income of Mayall's band to join the new group, and the name Green had already put forward stuck for good. Their first show was that August at the Windsor Jazz·Blues Festival (McVie hadn't yet joined, so Bob Brunning played bass), and their starting point was recreating American Chicago blues in their own way. (Direction) From the start, these young white Englishmen didn't want to simply copy Black American blues; they wanted to make the grammar of the musicians they admired their own. Green worshipped B.B. King and Robert Johnson, while Spencer made impersonating Elmore James almost a full-time pursuit. The tension between this reverence and imitation gave the band its first color.
II. Albatross and Green's Decline · 1968–1970
(Debut) Their 1968 debut album Fleetwood Mac got off to a smooth start, climbing into the upper reaches of the British charts. A second guitarist, Danny Kirwan, soon joined to complete a three-guitar lineup, and the blues of Green·Spencer·Kirwan overlapped in three distinct colors. (Hit) The instrumental Albatross, released late that year, topped the British singles chart. A single slow, wordless guitar melody had carried a blues band to the top of the pop charts. Green wasn't pleased with the success, fearing the band would be commercially corrupted. (Christine) That same year, session vocalist Christine Perfect married McVie. She formally joined the band in 1970, adding keyboards and vocals, weaving soft melodies into the band's rougher blues. (Collapse) After using LSD in 1970, Green began suffering severe anxiety and delusions and left the band that year. He spoke of a revulsion toward money and possessions and tried to give away his wealth, and was later diagnosed with schizophrenia. The 1959 Gibson Les Paul he played became legendary under the name 'Greeny,' and decades later Metallica's Kirk Hammett bought it and still plays it on stage today.
The calmest song Green, who feared success, ever made — it carried the band from blues clubs to the top of the pop charts.
- The slide guitar in the intro lays down the song's mood with a slow glissando that feels like waves rolling in.
- The drums are said to have been played less for precise timekeeping than for the sound of waves, brushed with wire brushes.
- Over nearly three wordless minutes, the same melody repeats in slightly different tones, creating relaxation rather than tension.
- Two or more guitars were layered through overdubbing, so that different melodies play from the left and right speakers.
Written while Green was torn between commercial success and faith, the song's very division into two parts reflects his confusion.
- Part one opens with a short, rough riff (a brief repeating guitar phrase) and drives forward relentlessly, while part two suddenly shifts to a quiet acoustic guitar and flute melody.
- The vocal is delivered in short, almost spat-out bursts; the story goes that Green was embarrassed by his own lyrics and sang them deliberately offhandedly.
- The Spanish-tinged guitar melody of the second part is almost never played live, making it a side of Green audible only on the recorded version.
III. The Blues Boys Scattered · 1971–1974
(Departure) In 1971, Spencer vanished without a trace in Los Angeles during an American tour. Days later he turned up having joined a religious group called the Children of God, and he never returned to the band. The members hurriedly called in Peter Green to fill in for the remaining shows. (Kirwan) Remaining guitarist Danny Kirwan took over leadership of the band, but he grew increasingly dependent on alcohol, and erratic behavior offstage got him fired in 1972. His place was filled by guitarist Bob Weston and vocalist Dave Walker. Even before that, the 1971 addition of American guitarist Bob Welch as Spencer's replacement had already begun nudging the band away from blues toward a smoother rock sound. (Relocation) In early 1974, manager Clifford Davis sent a fake band touring under the borrowed name 'Fleetwood Mac' with none of the real members in it, and the actual members sued to win the name back. In the wake of that lawsuit, the band left Britain that year and made Los Angeles, California its new base. This uproar over money and the name left the band with a lesson: it had to protect its own identity itself.
A song that captures the period when, with Bob Welch's arrival, the band was shifting from blues to mellow California rock.
- The jazz-tinged guitar chords underpinning the whole song give off a hazy, loose feeling in place of the edge of the band's blues years.
- Bass and drums repeat almost the same pattern without variation, creating a body-swaying rhythm (groove) that supports the song's mysterious mood.
- Welch's vocal never rises into a shout, flowing instead in a low murmur that contrasts sharply with the band's earlier, rougher blues vocals.
· 1975–1977
(Joining) In 1975, California couple Lindsey Buckingham and Stevie Nicks joined the band after releasing one duo album and splitting up as a duo. Buckingham brought guitar and production, Nicks her mysterious voice and songwriting, and with their arrival the band completed its transformation from a British blues band into an American California rock band. (Turning point) Their self-titled album Fleetwood Mac, released that same year, topped the American charts. Songs like Rhiannon and Over My Head filled the radio, and for the first time the band found greater success in America than in Britain. (Cracks) But success arrived alongside the collapse of all five members' personal lives. The McVies went through a divorce, and Buckingham and Nicks also ended their relationship, as both later confirmed in official interviews. Instead of suppressing these feelings, the band carried them into the studio. (Rumours) The 1977 album Rumours was the direct recording of that rupture. Songs Buckingham wrote for Nicks and Christine wrote for McVie sat side by side on the same album, which sold more than forty million copies worldwide and won the Grammy for Album of the Year the following year. The Chain, the only song credited to all five members as songwriters, was stitched together from fragments of different session tapes — a song that laid the band's condition bare.
A mysterious character song Nicks brought to the band, it became the new lineup's first signature track.
- Nicks's vocal grows slightly more intense with each verse, and the song is known live for a variation late in the song that builds to something close to a scream.
- Christine McVie's keyboards lie beneath the song, creating a mysterious mood, while Buckingham's guitar adds tension through brief, ornamental interjections rather than a flashy solo.
- In the bridge (the song's middle transition), choral vocals suddenly stack layer upon layer, creating the effect of many voices surrounding a single person.
Written by Nicks as she went through her breakup with Buckingham, it holds the calmest place on Rumours.
- The song is carried on just two chords, drawing all attention to the subtle tremor in the melody and vocal.
- Nicks's voice sinks low instead of belting out, so the song sounds less like anger than acceptance.
- The tambourine and light percussion laid beneath the chorus keep the song feeling buoyant rather than letting it grow too heavy.
The result of five people bringing their breakups and emotions into the studio, "The Chain" is the only song credited to all five members as songwriters.
- Knowing that The Chain was stitched together from fragments recorded in different sessions, you understand why the sudden bass entrance in the middle stands out so starkly.
- The passage late in the song where McVie's bass riff steps out alone like a solo is always the moment that draws the biggest cheer live.
- Throughout the album, vocal harmonies layer the voices of Buckingham, Nicks, and Christine, and even amid the conflict, the sound is remarkably harmonious.
V. From Tusk to Tango · 1979–1987
(Backlash) In 1979, reacting against commercial success, Buckingham pushed through the double album (an album holding two records' worth of material at once) Tusk. He drew, in his own way, on the raw, stripped-down textures of the punk·new wave he was listening to at the time — bands like the Clash and Talking Heads — and it sold far less than the label expected. (Recovery) In 1982, the band returned to a more commercial direction with Mirage, and on 1987's Tango in the Night, Buckingham made heavy use of synthesizers (keyboard instruments that synthesize sound through electronic circuitry) in the home studio he had built. Songs like "Everywhere" and "Little Lies" sent the band back to the top of the charts. (Departure) But as the tour approached, tension grew between Buckingham and the rest of the band, and he left over disagreements about the tour plans. Billy Burnette and Rick Vito filled in as touring guitarists.
An experimental track Buckingham pushed through in defiance of commercial success, it is the title song of the double album.
- The entire USC marching band was brought into an empty Dodger Stadium to record brass and percussion live on site, giving the whole track the feel of a marching band tune.
- The vocals consist entirely of short, almost shouted phrases repeated over and over instead of a polished melody, deliberately distancing the song from the band's earlier smooth pop sound.
- The drums were deliberately recorded raw, imitating the rough textures of the punk·new wave the band was listening to at the time.
A sound carefully built up by Buckingham in his home studio, it is a song that symbolizes the band's last peak.
- From the very opening, shimmering synthesizer tones layered in the foreground give the track a texture completely different from the guitar-driven sound of the 1970s.
- Christine McVie's vocals stay relaxed even in the high notes, floating lightly and giving the whole song a buoyant feel.
- The chorus vocal harmonies were carefully layered across multiple tracks (overdubbing) so they sound like a choir rather than a single voice.
VI. Scattering and the 1997 reunion · 1987–1997
(Hiatus) After Buckingham left, the album Behind the Mask was released in 1990, but it failed to make the same impact as before. Nicks began to focus more on her solo career, and the band was kept together only loosely. (Clinton) In 1993, when Bill Clinton used "Don't Stop," written by Christine McVie, as his presidential campaign theme song, the five original members, by then almost completely disbanded, briefly reunited for his inaugural celebration. The reunion lasted only a day, but it showed what was possible. (Reunion) In 1997, Fleetwood, the two McVies, Nicks, and Buckingham fully reunited, toured together, and released the live album The Dance. The very fact that people who had wounded one another while making Rumours twenty years earlier were standing on the same stage again was itself big news.
VII. Those who came back, those who left · 1998–2022
(Hiatus) Christine McVie quit touring in 1998 and returned to England. The remaining four members released the album Say You Will without her in 2003. (Return) Christine came back for a tour in 2014, and in 2017 she released a duo album with Buckingham, continuing their long partnership. (Dismissal) In 2018, the band let Buckingham go over disagreements about tour plans, and Mike Campbell, Tom Petty's guitarist, and Neil Finn of Crowded House filled in to continue the tour. (Loss) In November 2022, Christine McVie died of a stroke. The band has never formally announced a breakup, but it has not resumed any activity, and the remaining members continue making music on their own.
Lesser-known stories
Green's original surname was Greenbaum. He was born into a Jewish immigrant family in London's East End, and is said to have shortened his surname early on because of the antisemitism that pervaded the music industry. The name 'Fleetwood Mac' existed before the band itself did. In 1967, Green used studio time given to him by John Mayall to record an instrumental with Fleetwood and McVie, and the track itself was titled "Fleetwood Mac." When the real band formed a few months later, the name was already in place. The influence of "Albatross" turns up in unexpected places. George Harrison of the Beatles once admitted that the guitar melody of "Sun King," on Abbey Road, came from "Albatross." It is a rare case of a British blues band influencing the greatest band of its era, rather than the other way around. Christine McVie was already a star before she joined Fleetwood Mac. As the vocalist and keyboardist of the blues band Chicken Shack, she was voted best female vocalist several years running in a readers' poll by the British music magazine Melody Maker. So although she is remembered as the member who 'joined later,' she was in fact already an established musician.
Glossary notes 📚🔎
Riff
(In rock) A short, repeated melody or chord progression that forms the backbone of a song. Like a chant or clapping pattern repeated together in gym class, a riff keeps returning throughout a song, tying it together. (Elsewhere) The word 'riff' is also used in everyday speech to mean picking up on something someone said and improvising on it.
Slide guitar
(In rock) A technique in which a bottle or metal tube (a slide) is pressed against the guitar strings and moved along them instead of using the fingers. It connects notes with a smooth slide rather than cutting between them, producing a sound almost like a crying voice. A keyboard can't fill the gap between two notes, but slide guitar smooths right over it.
Overdubbing
(Etymology) From the English meaning 'to layer something over.' (In rock) A method of recording new performances or vocals over music that has already been recorded. It's similar to recording your own voice over a pre-recorded accompaniment during a school choir rehearsal. (Elsewhere) In film, dubbing refers to re-recording an actor's original voice in another language.
Double album
(In rock) An album released with songs spread across two LPs at once (or an equivalent amount of material). It usually holds twice as many songs as a single album, becoming a vehicle for every experiment a band wants to try. It's similar to stretching a sports day from one day to two so more events can fit in.
Synthesizer
(Etymology) From the English 'synthesize.' So a synthesizer is literally 'a machine that synthesizes sound.' (In rock) A keyboard instrument that uses electronic circuitry to create the sounds of various instruments or entirely new sounds. Just as a paint program mixes colors to create new ones, a synthesizer mixes raw sound material to create new timbres.
Groove
(In rock) A repetitive, body-moving rhythmic feel created when the bass and drums interlock. It's similar to the way your body moves on its own when you hit the beat just right while jumping rope.