Fleetwood Mac, The #12 Artist of the Rock Era, Part Four

 

(Continued from Part Three)

Buckingham in many ways is to thank for this great album.  We knew about his singing, his songwriting ability, and by this time his guitar playing.  Another skill he brought to the group was his sense of adventure when it came to songwriting, recording, and performing.  This experimentation began taking shape with Mac's next album Tusk.  Having gained the trust of the other members, Lindsey was allowed to work on several of the tracks by himself at home before bringing them to the attention of the rest of the group.

When you have three all-time great songwriters at the the peak of their careers, you get the bonus of a double album.  There simply was too many great tracks to limit it to a single.  We'll feature the hits, of course, but many of you are going to be exposed to all the other great tracks on this incredible album for the first time.  They too will soon become among your Fleetwood Mac favorites as well.  

 

The first single admittedly took some getting used to.  Unconventional is putting it mildly.  Buckingham showed that one doesn't have to write a traditional hit that fits the conventional mold, even when you're on top of the world as this group was.  Together with the USC Trojan Marching band, this is the innovative "Tusk" that eventually became a worldwide hit (#3 in Australia, #4 in New Zealand, #5 in Canada, #6 in the U.K., #7 in Germany and #8 in the United States).

 

The next single was Christine's hit "Think About Me".

 

Tusk reached #1 in the U.K., New Zealand, #2 in Australia, #3 in Germany, the Netherlands, and France, and #4 in the U.S.  Stevie also had a single released from the album, a song that when she wrote it was 16 minutes long and had nine more verses than the edited version that appears on the album--the beautiful "Sara".

 

This is the first of eight great album tracks from Tusk that we will feature-- Here is "Save Me A Place".

Fleetwood Mac toured for 11 months to support the album, playing before crowds in the United States, the U.K., Germany, Australia, New Zealand, the Netherlands, France, Japan, and Belgium and toured Germany with Bob Marley.  They recorded performances and released it as a live album in 1980, which went Gold.  Here we have the very personal song written about her relationship with Lindsey when it began to change.  Here's the great Stevie Nicks song "Storms".

Fleetwood has said (about Buckingham's work on Tusk) "Kudos to Lindsey ... for us not doing a replica of Rumours."

 

Buckingham to this day was greatly influenced by New Wave music.  Here is just one of the examples of that influence on the Tusk album--"I Know I'm Not Wrong".

In addition to playing the drums, 

Fleetwood recorded another drum part 

drumming on Kleenex boxes.  "So since

Tusk, I've often looked for alternatives 

for the function of things such as the 

snare and hi-hat--" he said for Will Romano's article in Electronic

Musician.  "anything that would get 

away from the norm."  "I'd think 'What

can I do on the two and four (beat of 

the song) that doesn't sound like a 

snare?'" he said.  "Of course, in Rock,

you need the action and rhythm of that

instrument, but why not subvert the norm

 and find other things?"

 

Here is one of Nicks' best ballads, written

about a brief relationship with road

manager Derek Taylor.  

Taylor was a journalist who also worked 

with the Beach Boys, the Byrds, Nilsson,

the Monterey Pop Festival, and WEA

Records.  But Taylor was best known for

his time with the Beatles.  Two songs

by Beatles members name check him--in "Blue Jay Way", George Harrison

awaits Derek Taylor to visit him on a

foggy night, while Taylor's name also

appears in John Lennon's "Give Peace

A Chance."

"Everybody has your road manager,"

Nicks said.  "We had J.C., crazy J.C.

(John Courage).  Led Zeppelin had Peter

Grant," she continued.  "The road 

managers are the ones who know

everything.  And I learned so much about

the whole world of the Beatles and it

was stunning. This is " "Beautiful Child".

 

We told you many of these tracks are among The Top Underrated Songs of the Rock Era*.  This one is in the Top 100* of that group.  Starting slow, it builds and builds, punctuated by writer Stevie Nicks' incredible vocal ability.  

It would have been a smash hit if a single--"Angel".  When asked by Jim Ladd in a 1979 interview about the line "So I close my eyes softly/'Til I become that part of the wind", Stevie said:

            That's from the story of "Rhiannon"...there's 

            a man, in the story of "Rhiannon" and his 

            name is Arawn...who is the great lord of

            darkness--who is the man who possesses the

            power to take or give life, but he only takes 

            life.  Aaron is my father's name and my 

            brother's name.  And Aaron is also my

            grandfather's name, so it is many things to me.

            And so Arawn touched the twins with his hand

            so that they would sleep.  And in that sleep

            there will be no pain.  And in that nonexistence

            of pain there will be happiness.  Because it 

            was only given with great love.  And this was

            in a haunted song, and a charmed hour, and

            this was the angel...of my dreams.

Alumnus Peter Green was brought in to play guitar on this memorable Christine McVie tune.  Atmospheric and featuring great bass work from John, here is the dreamy, hypnotic "Brown Eyes".

Fleetwood said many years later that Tusk was his favorite.  It is for many fans because of songs like this.  "Sisters Of The Moon" rose out of a jam session at Village Recorders Studio in Los Angeles.  Live performances featured extended eight-minute versions of the song.

 

Tusk has gone over four million in sales in the U.S. alone, and much of the album's sales were artificially kept down when RKO played the entire album before its release, leading to mass taping.  When the world discovers how great it is, it will explode.  This album will be listened to for decades.  Here is Buckingham's  "What Makes You Think You're The One".

Christine wrote so many great ballads with so much feeling and emotion.  Here is one of Mac's prettiest and moody songs--"Never Make Me Cry".  It was released as the B-side to "Tusk", but has earned a great reputation in its own right.

There's much more to hear from this one-of-a-kind group!