Fleetwood Mac: Classic or Dud

Neil is in a no-win situation here, I think. Well, except his wallet wins, I guess.

Said it before, somewhere, but I would love to see Fleetwood Mac backing Neil Finn. Campbell can come along, too.

honestly do bands ever come off well on TV shows? i feel like the sound is always super weak and the whole thing feels weird

there's a lot of good tv performances from the 60s/70s

And the 80s and the 90s and in the 2000s -- competent sound techs help, and bands that just do their thing regardless tend to do better (which benefits post-punk and post-jazz groups disproportionately). Big thrown together pop groups on Ellen are likely at a big disadvantage. Don't get me wrong -- I suspect the tour's gonna suck and Fleetwood Mac doing a tv show with sound that band speaks poorly for the togetherness of the whole enterprise, but it's hard to judge a mess that big as the players' fault.

Watching it again, I will say this about the performance -- Mike and Neil are trying to lock in with Mick, and they both come from bands where that worked well. Mick Fleetwood's not that drummer at all, and successful guitarists in Fleetwood Mac tend to push him forward (naturally or chemically) and he holds the whole thing back and keeps it in place. This performance drags badly before the bass solo because of the "no, YOU play first" game of chicken going on.

Also, Neil Finn is a great leader and front man, just not for a band like Fleetwood Mac, or at least not in the intense, high strung Lindsey Buckingham mode. Will he be able to banter? Make jokes? Who's going to do the talking on stage, Stevie all night?

And yeah, not just Mick, the rest of the band is famous for staring daggers at one another, which drives the performances. But when Neil Finn and Stevie Nicks are staring at each other on stage, what are they looking at? There's no history.

Neil was fine, but stevie was mic'd way too low. and how many extra musicians were there onstage there?

this is still one of my favourite live performances of anything ever
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dGykwC0fdJ4

― canary christ (stevie),

Top yt comment: “you can actually hear the cocaine” made me laugh.

FM has had a bunch of extra musicians on stage since their The Dance reunion, iirc.

Here they are doing Gypsy.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tD2EUMr_Fww

It's much better, or at least a better fit for this lineup.

Weird, though, they seem to cut out the guitar solo.

Youtube comments on the ellen performance mostly seem to agree that Neil doesn’t really work in here. I think that the song choice was probably inadequate as well, they should have went for a nicks or mcvie led ballad... they probably chose the chain as it’s the song most young people now identify of them by its appearance in Guardians Of the Galaxy.

Anyways it just doesn’t work and qs exemplified by the 1982 performance it’s a song that demands too much energy and works better when performed somewhat incohesively, close but not together. Not waiting for the other band members to cue you in.

Still clueless vocals mixing on Gypsy (all three voices should go RIGHT UP FRONT, only the hired hand voices should be quieter, dammit), but the rhythm issue is much less of a problem -- but that's because this one has John pushing the tempo, letting Mick try to keep up with him.

Basically this lineup is totally misbegotten. You can replace Lindsey Buckingham, but it is a mistake to replicate him, especially when you invite a world-class songwriter to join your band.

Two world-class songwriters, if you include Mike Campbell.

yeah it would be cool if they did another transformation of the band
but kinda feel like no one is invested enough in it at this point to try

Au contraire, they are *literally* too invested.

or yeah i know what you mean, i guess i mean motivated, like they just probably want to get the dough from the tour and be done

If they thought of money in terms of millions rather than tens or hundreds of millions they would tour smaller venues and try something different.

not only did Campbell not get the closing solo in "Gypsy," but he barely tried those fills in the middle eight…

yeah it would be cool if they did another transformation of the band
but kinda feel like no one is invested enough in it at this point to try

this is the first performance with the ringer bloke that Mick likes and wanted to bring in, on the least adventurous talk show in America. even if the others were open to changing methods or arrangements or writing new material, it'd be unlikely to happen until they've played full shows in front of audiences and learnt who they are as a band.

they should just keep it going like the Harlem Globetrotters, no need for the Mac brand to end anytime soon. There are plenty of musicians out there, there will be plenty still 100 years from now.

in vancouver nov 14 - not sure about going yet...how many of you peoples are going to shows

Considered it until I saw the Ellen clip. I guess it depends what the setlists are like (that is, how much Neil Finn and/or Tom Petty, but either of those could be gross, too, in this context). Would definitely have considered it more if it were a smaller theater and not an arena

Noticed Finn & Campbell are getting the Daryl Jones treatment in the promo pics I've been seeing for the tour.

seeing Lindsey instead

Smart move, he is great live.

3-Disc solo anthology looks good: https://www.rhino.com/product/solo-anthology-the-best-of-lindsey-buckingham#3cd-deluxe

I did the quick math and you can fit almost all of his albums on three discs. But I'm OK with getting some of those odds and sods in one place.

Noticed Finn & Campbell are getting the Daryl Jones treatment in the promo pics I've been seeing for the tour.

This is a toss-up - between casual fans who don’t know about the lineup change, and might be put off by confusing photos, vs ppl energised by the lineup change and keen to see it. Plus the likelihood that it’s a one-tour lineup, with no record, there’s no strong impetus to include two of the (four? five?) touring musicians in promo shots.

It’s total bullshit that Jones hasn’t been appearing in Stones photos since, say, 1993, though. He’s been in twice as long as Ronnie was before Wood became an actual member, and Wood still got to be in photos the whole time.

Huh, every FM picture I saw had Mike and Neil in it.

Like this one:

https://www.reviewjournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/10712323_web1_web-Fleetwood-Mac-courtesy.jpg

idk how you can hire two guys that prominent to replace LB and leave them out of any/all promo photos

Ok, the pics I saw online promoting the Houston show were all 4-shots of the McVie's, Stevie & Mick.

Speaking of pics, I was just reminded of all these vintage Mac tour tees a local record shop got in and were selling awhile back. One of them iirc was from '90 and had a huge band pic w/Burnette & Vito.

reporting john mcvie's blue jeans to this thread.

Well here you go again, you’ve pissed your diaper

Nice of Martha Stewart to join them for the shoot

Opening setlist ... predictably weird?

1. "The Chain"
2. "Little Lies"
3. "Dreams"
4. "Second Hand News" (Neil Finn on vocals)
5. "Say You Love Me"
6. "Black Magic Woman" (1968 single, Stevie Nicks on vocals)
7. "Everywhere"
8. "I Got You" (Split Enz cover, Finn on vocals)
9. "Rhiannon"
10. "Tell Me All the Things You Do" (from Kiln House, 1970)
11. "Storms"
12. "World Turning" (featuring drum / percussion duel)
13. "Hypnotized" (from Mystery to Me, 1973, Finn on vocals)
14. "Oh Well" (Mike Campbell on vocals)
15. "Don't Dream It's Over" (Crowded House cover, Finn and Nicks duet)
16. "Landslide"
17. "Isn't It Midnight" (from Tango in the Night, 1987)
18. "Monday Morning"
19. "You Make Loving Fun"
20. "Gold Dust Woman"
21. "Go Your Own Way"
encore
22. "Free Fallin'" (Tom Petty cover, Nicks on vocals)
23. "Don't Stop"
24. "All Over Again" (From Time, 1995 - Nicks and Christine McVie on vocals)

WOW @ Closing w/something from Time...

That is an AMAZING setlist.

it is p cool yeah, do we have audio?

TS: Mike Campbell's hair

13. "Hypnotized" (from Mystery to Me, 1973, Finn on vocals)

oh good i was actually hoping for something like this to happen

I hope they mix it up a bit over the tour, that would be interesting. I have a feeling they will not go.

not though

I read in a recent interview w/Campbell that he had to learn 60-something songs for the tour, so I imagine they'll rotate the obscurities and deep cuts some. I mean, that's kind of party for the course w/most legacy acts of their stature.

"Par For The Course" obvs.

Actually, it's not! FM absolutely not famous for shaking things up, afaict.

13. "Hypnotized" (from Mystery to Me, 1973, Finn on vocals)

oh good i was actually hoping for something like this to happen

― princess of hell (BradNelson), Friday, October 5, 2018 6:42 AM (two hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

bringing back Bob stuff w/Finn on vox would be so crucial

Or Kirwan stuff! I can hear a version of "Woman of 1000 Years" in my head with Stevie harmonies, but that's probably way too obscuro.