Fleetwood Mac – Mirage, C/D?

i bought it from the dollar bin

"hold me" and "gypsy" are so good that i was dismayed at how much i do not enjoy the full album

Xp to Ross

I feel like LB found some super close but rounded way to record his guitars with this production. There are all these great little guitar incidents that are tiny yet super present and colorful

Papas Fritas admit their Fleetwood Mac influence with a stripped down "Book of Love" cover:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3KJHNddSzLo

However, if you've heard "People Say," you already know how much they love Mirage:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bxiOSmAE3rM

She was just a dream maker,
Dreamer of sighs
Shadow on the one who used to cry

Can't believe this revive has not mentioned the incredible "Eyes of the World" yet.

eyes eyes eyes eyes

BACK AND FORTH LIES UNFUUUURRRLLLL

Love "Straight Back". What a production job building up and sustaining a lyric that's about ... who the f___ knows what but it sounds gorgeous in the process. Great headphones albums these (Rumours thru Tango).

mirage remaster is i think the best remaster i've ever heard

Loving it!

mirage remaster is i think the best remaster i've ever heard

― mellon collie and the infinite bradness (BradNelson),

It transformed the album for me.

"Straight Back" is the only new song Nicks contributed; "Gypsy" and the too underrated "That's Alright" are Rumours and Tusk cast-offs.

I know "Tusk" and "Tango" feature tracks that are, for all purposes, entirely Lindsey. Is that true for "Mirage" as well? Like "Can't Go Back" or "Empire State" or "Oh Diane," they sound like they could be Lindsey solo specials.

"Eyes of the World," too. The drums on that one, "Can't Go Back" and "Diane" could even very well be looped or drum machine.

I'd say "Empire State" sounds like a solo performance.

The band's done terrific live performances of "Eyes of the World" in the last thirty years.

oh good a new opportunity to embed this video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7TV6BEwJEKI

"Straight Back" is the only new song Nicks contributed; "Gypsy" and the too underrated "That's Alright" are Rumours and Tusk cast-offs.

― TikTok to the (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, August 18, 2020 6:16 AM (two hours ago)

nope, "That's Alright" dates back to the Buckingham/Nicks demos:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DvFKPtBuNCY

Alfred you esp. should hear those demos if you haven't.

I knew that both Nicks & Buckingham had deep NorCal roots (both attended Menlo-Atherton HS & San Jose State, then Rumours was recorded in Sausalito), but this little gem in the wiki for Buckingham Nicks demo:

In 1972, the two continued to write songs, recording demo tapes at night in Daly City on a half-inch four-track Ampex tape machine Buckingham kept at the coffee roasting plant belonging to his father.

Alfred you esp. should hear those demos if you haven't.

― Jersey Al (Albert R. Broccoli),

I am! It's frustrating in the best sense to hear McVie's demo for what became "You & I, Part II" and realize what it's missing, hence the Buckingham co-writing credit.

"Book of Love" still my absolute fave!!

^^^

SURELY HE MUST KNOW ALL THE RUUULLLLES

SURELY HE MUST KNOW ALL THE RUUULLLLES

ha ha ha ha

Buckingham’s best work here has this quality of being totally pop and completely unhinged at the same time. I expect him to collapse and start frothing at the mouth during “The Book of Love”.

Well, he started frothing in this 1982 performance of "The Chain."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dGykwC0fdJ4

https://youtu.be/RTa6KEE9cZU

Well, he started frothing in this 1982 performance of "The Chain."

📹

Buckingham is visibly off his face in the video for Trouble, as are his backimg band.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OyONfX5bpyQ

By most/many accounts Lindsey was not into coke, and certainly not to the debilitating degree of Mick or Stevie. I'm sure he dabbled, but I suspect he's just naturally high strung. But then you watch the 1982 video and you think ... just naturally high strung?

It does seem that when bands get into coke that's when things go downhill. But in the case of Fleetwood Mac, when Mick and Stevie went nuts with the stuff it took Lindsey to keep everyone in line (har) and/or salvage their work, which implies he was *not* off his head. And all of his solo stuff is very consistent, very much of a piece and style, so I do wonder if that's just the way he is.

He's not a coke guy; he's been public for years about his epilepsy. Less so about his anger, especially toward women.

I defer to you experts but in the Caillat book he mentions LB snorting up the drugs more than once

Sure. But Nicks is candid: she has said he did drugs, just fewer and less often than the others

From what I know of the era it sounds like everyone was doing some coke, but Lindsey said he was more a pot guy.

sigh, I was only able to appreciate “don’t stop” when some poster (m bison?) pointed out that it works better if you imagine Lindsey *extremely on cocaine*

The Simpsons is how I had that revelation, when Bart sings "Don't Stop" after taking a bunch of Focusyn

sigh, I was only able to appreciate “don’t stop” when some poster (m bison?) pointed out that it works better if you imagine Lindsey *extremely on cocaine*

― brimstead, Tuesday, August 18, 2020 5:53 PM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

this sounds like some shit i said, m bison otm

terrified that my urge to hear Book Of Love after a dramatic day means I have the emotional maturity of Lindsey Buckingham

whoa oh oh ohhhhhhohhhhhhh

just center yourself on the rock solid emotional maturity of john mcvie, be the penguin

interesting "that's alright" goes all the way back to buckingham/nicks

an all time tune for me, enjoy the alternate version too

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ngO6-a6NAIc

One of the last times Nicks could hit those high notes before her nose surrendered to coke.

Love Mirage! That's Alright is a really strong song, after hearing the coffee plant demo and realizing how old it is I'm surprised they waited until the 80s before using it. Maybe it was too C/W for the prior albums? I dunno. Better song to me than I Don't Want to Know or Blue Letter, both older tunes dusted off and repurposed for FM.

"That's Alright" is the only non-single on here that's memorable to me.
I was pretty surprised, hearing this record years after their 70s run, how traditional the sound palette was, and especially knowing how completely they'd give in to sampling and programming on the follow-up. I guess 1982 was just on the cusp of these superstar acts still recording with piano, organ, "organic"-sounding harmonies, etc. Also probably the conservatism reflects Lindsey being a good boy after Tusk.

I don't find this album particularly traditional-sounding, especially given the much-vaunted experimentalism of Tusk is largely confined to a handful of tracks (that's not a criticism: a tune like "Over and Over" is not terribly experimental but is still absolutely gorgeous-sounding).

On Mirage the interplay of competing elements - both between various instruments and then between lead versus backing vocals - is incredibly intense, even as formally there is more of an investment in "classic" pop manoeuvres (e.g. the harmonies having a slight barbershop vibe at times).

This culminates on "Hold Me" which is like an intricately wrought musical box, but also elsewhere and more subtly, like on "Only Over You": the complex but unthreatening interweaving of distant sighing backing vocals, churning bass, whining or droning organ, rat a tat drum rolls and a twinkling King Sunny Ade guitar solo from another room (notice how this song immediately repeats the trick from "Gypsy" of fading out on what might have been a much longer solo).

And of course "Eyes of the World" is just nuts, the intro to the guitar solo where it's like a serrated knife cutting through the rest of the arrangement in order to take over the track feels like peak Buckingham to me.

A close listen reveals the importance of Mirage as a bridge between Tusk and Tango rather than as a retrenchment.

My ears always fix on the gated/prominent reverb of this album. The eighties!

Mirage sounds conservative only next to Tusk.

I've realized that Halfway there but for you just about never agree on music.

* Halfway there but for you and I

My ears always fix on the gated/prominent reverb of this album. The eighties!

― Reeves Gabrels' Funko Pop (majorairbro),

This album doesn't sound '80s. The ethos is still post-punk.

just about never agree on music.

We like some of the same things, just different parts. That's one of the things I like to learn on this site.