the band were instantly dispelled upon
seeing the exciting stage show, which
now included not just one, but two rock
starlets. Accompanying the divas on stage
were the thumping drums and bass of
Fleetwood, the clean, proficient guitar
work of Lindsey Buckingham and the
foot-stomping rhythm of John McVie.
The 1975 Fleetwood Mac tour, with the
definitive tenth line-up, probably found
them at their happiest and most dynamic
for many years. Yet, it was not long before
hairline fissures started appearing in the
band’s makeup. Buckingham was already
feeling the strain that playing somebody
else’s music has on a musician. Being a
decidedly independent man and wanting
to retain his personal style made it hard
for Buckingham to dovetail sweetly
into playing Bob Welch songs without
a second thought, but he persevered,
perhaps because Nicks seemed to be
enjoying the trip and felt more at home in
the group than he did.
From August through to December
1975, Fleetwood Mac were on the road,
gigging virtually every night and working
hard to sell the new album, the new
band, and the new look. The tour was
naturally a chance for the band really to
get to know one another and to establish
their core identity, and without the
excess and isolation that came with their
later fame, Fleetwood Mac was able to
bond as a unit. The tour had the effect
of smoothing out any glitches in their
performances and creating that natural
rapport that is so important between
band members on stage.
Despite their live success, Fleetwood
Mac now faced strong pressure from
their record label and the business side of
the music industry, so in 1976, Warner
decided to release Rhiannon as a single.
Fortunately Rhiannon proved an
immediate hit, and did much to vindicate
Stevie Nicks’s place in the band as well
as relieving some of the pressure from
Warner. After Rhiannon, Christine’s
Say You Love Me was released to similar
success, however this was sadly only true
of their sales in the US, as at that point in
the mid-seventies, Fleetwood Mac were
still finding it hard to get anywhere in the
British charts.
For example, when Rhiannon was
put out as a single in Britain it struggled
lamentably to make the Top 100, let
alone the Top Twenty. The single’s highest
recorded chart position was a miserable
No. 46. The difficulty the Fleetwood
Mac experienced in Britain was more
than likely due, in some small measure,
to the loyalty showed by the fans to Peter
Green’s version of the band, which was a
blues and rock outfit rather than rock and
pop. Back in 1975 and 1976, the music
industry in Britain was turning out the
last of the glitter bands before the advent
of punk came along to reshape musical
tastes indefinitely.
Much of the listening public felt
somewhat lost. Having been raised on the
Beatles and the Stones, and being used
to taking the seminal trips experienced
growing up with bands like the Pink
Floyd, Frank Zappa or Bob Dylan, rock
fans were now expected to lap up the
Bay City Rollers and Donny Osmond. It
was a tough time for many listeners, and
although these bands were the teeny-
bop chart makers, they still dominated
the radio airwaves and television
performances of the era.The in-your-face brutality of punk
was the natural successor to this trend,
as the commercially produced hit makers
that went before seemed so paper-thin
and soulless in comparison. At least Sid
Vicious seemed like he really meant it.
It was into this UK music culture, that
Fleetwood Mac was trying to sell what
was seen as out-dated arena pop rock.
The kind of people who were British
blues music fans, and who had taken
on board Peter Green’s immense talent,
were not keen to accept what was seen
as a less noble substitute. Comparatively
in the States, musical appreciation was
a far more fluid affair and didn’t have a
countrywide basis; one trend could be
kicking off in New York while an entirely
different scene was breaking through on
the West Coast.Stevie Nicks performing in 1979.