Upon the departure of singer/songwriter/guitarist Bob Welch, Mick Fleetwood rejiggered the Fleetwood Mac lineup so successfully that Summer 1975’s “white album” simply entitled Fleetwood Mac had such a wealth of strong songs that it was easy for radio programmers to overlook a gem like “Blue Letter”. On their first tour in Fall 1975 with the new band including rookies Lindsey Buckingham and Stevie Nicks, the band’s live delivery of “Blue Letter” at their performance at the University of Connecticut made it musical priority mail. –Redbeard
Tag: Lindsey Buckingham
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Fleetwood Mac- Blue Letter- UCONN 10/75
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Buckingham Nicks- Lindsey Buckingham, Stevie Nicks Rare Interview
Writing in Esquire magazine, Fleetwood Mac biographer Alan Light reminded us,”The (1973) Buckingham Nicks album itself has always been something of a mystery because it quickly went out of print and, for reasons that are entirely unclear, has never been available on CD or on streaming services…It’s one of pop’s more historically significant records that had fallen out of circulation, and its release is cause for celebration.”Long before Stevie Nicks became a star as a solo performer; before she and her musical partner ( then lover) Lindsey Buckingham helped to transform the British blues rock band Fleetwood Mac into one of the top-selling groups of all time; even before her professional recording debut in 1973 on the album Buckingham Nicks, Stephanie Lynn Nicks was living a real- life version of the Glass Menagerie, as you can hear in my classic rock interview.
Stevie Nicks: “I remember exactly what it was like to be 20. I mean, I was a cleaning lady, I was a waitress. I had problems… I mean, Lindsey (Buckingham) and me together trying to figure out how we’re going to make it in the music business. And this is the only thing that either of us wanted to do. And what if we didn’t we make it ? I had to go to school. And he didn’t so… that, ya know, he had all this time. I didn’t have much time. I mean I was an emotional wreck at 20. Oh, yeah. I was an emotional wreck at 18, because that’s when I started singing in a band with Lindsey and we played three and ½ solid years up and down the San Francisco peninsula, and opened for all the big huge bands in that special moment in time that was Haight-Ashbury and San Francisco. Where everybody came. And so I got to stand and watch from the side of the stage. Everybody. You name ‘em, we opened the show for ‘em. So I got like first hand experience, it’s the only reason I was able to walk into Fleetwood Mac without having a nervous breakdown. And walk out center front stage to the center mic and not just, ya know, collapse and faint, because I had already played in front of 75,000 people.
And to go from being that poor and having all these little jobs that I had, because Lindsey didn’t know how to do anything else except play music. And I could do anything. And did, to keep us going so that we could do it. Because at that time I had realized that we were going to make it if it killed me. And ya know working solidly to getting the Buckingham-Nicks deal and doing that record and having that record dropped and being just crushed. Because it’s one thing to be working towards it, and another to go into a big studio with a big producer and do a big record with all the 24 track board and everything and having the taste of the big time. And then be just be dropped like a hot potato, and go back to wondering if I should go back to school or if I should just work and let Lindsey pursue the music career. And I should just step out. Because by that time I was to the point where… ya know I’m very loyal and I certainly was Lindsey’s biggest fan and I thought he was the greatest guitar player in the world and had the most beautiful voice. He was one of those people that… I walked into a room once and he sat there and played a song and it was “rooms on fire”! He’s one of those. He was one of those men. And… whatever I had to do to keep him going was OK because it was more important for Lindsey than it was that I make it. Because I knew I could do a hundred other things and nobody could ever take my music away from me. I could still write songs and play. And, I could take my music in anything I did. I could go back to school. I only had a year to go to finish to get a masters. I could go back to school for three years and get a PhD. I would be fine. I knew that. 
I worried about him.I didn’t know what he would do. And because I was so in love with him there wasn’t any question in my mind that I would stick in there until if we didn’t both make it, at least I got him up there. And when you love somebody and you see the pain in their face, when they even consider the fact that you might not make it… it’s like, “Don’t even think that we’re not going to make it. We are.” And in my heart I’m saying to myself,”If I have to comb this town, I will find somebody to listen to us that will understand how good we are, or that God willing, at least know how good he is.” -Redbeard -
Fleetwood Mac- White Album 50th- Stevie Nicks, Mick Fleetwood
After Bob Welch left Fleetwood Mac, his first solo album in the Fall 1975 came and went in about 15 minutes, not unlike the 1973 Buckingham Nicks album, which was the sole recorded output of Welch’s replacements, singer/guitarist Lindsey Buckingham and singer/songwriter Stephanie “Stevie” Nicks. So on balance I didn’t see how this major change could do anything except diminish Fleetwood Mac.
Boy, was I wrong! That 1975 Fleetwood Mac album sold over twenty times as many copies as any previous Fleetwood Mac album. But the unsung hero is actually producer/recording engineer Keith Olsen, who had produced and recorded the Buckingham Nicks album, imparting a fat, warm, upfront sound to their music. It was in that context that bandleader Mick Fleetwood first noticed Lindsey Buckingham’s guitar playing and singing abilities, but at the time it was Keith Olsen’s studio and recording techniques that Mick was auditioning, not the musicians. When Fleetwood fell in love with the sound that he heard, he wisely decided to embrace all of it – the musicians Buckingham and Nicks, the producer Keith Olsen, the Sound City studio – and incorporate it all into the next Fleetwood Mac album, which featured “Monday Morning”,”Over My Head”,”Say You Love Me”,”Rhiannon”,”Crystal”, and “Landslide”.
Not only did that decision change the fortunes of all involved, it would also change the sound of contemporary music for years to follow. Stevie Nicks, Mick Fleetwood, and former member Lindsey Buckingham all share their recollections with me in great detail in this classic rock interview In the Studio on the golden anniversary of Fleetwood Mac’s “White Album”. –Redbeard -
Fleetwood Mac- Tusk pt2- Lindsey Buckingham, Stevie Nicks, Mick Fleetwood
The conclusion of In the Studio‘s in-depth exploration of the Tusk saga has some of the most frank, illuminating revelations about love, ambition, artistic integrity vs the pressures of commerce, youth, regret and, yes, music you will ever hear this side of a therapist’s couch. Here are Fleetwood Mac co-founder Mick Fleetwood, chanteuse Stevie Nicks, and multi-talented self-confessed “musical primitive” Lindsey Buckingham in my classic rock interviews pointedly about the controversial Tusk.After 1975’s self-titled Fleetwood Mac had slowly grown into the best-selling album in their record label’s long history, and the follow up Rumours had exploded into an international phenomenon, Fleetwood Mac singer/songwriter/guitarist Lindsey Buckingham knew that the Anglo-American outfit’s next offering, Tusk, needed to be different. Exactly how, and to what degree, turned out to be the source of great debate about the double album, inside and outside of the band. -Redbeard
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Fleetwood Mac- Tusk- Stevie Nicks, Lindsey Buckingham
The tale of the October 1979 Fleetwood Mac double album Tusk, which was the follow-up to the record-setting Rumours two years earlier, takes a full two episodes to tell, full of dizzying commercial success amid accusations of personal betrayal, conspiracy, and questions of creative direction and control. Band chanteuse Stevie Nicks and former Fleetwood Mac singer/guitarist/songwriter Lindsey Buckingham pull no punches in these classic rock interviews while weighing in on their personal takes on the Autumn 1979 album Tusk containing “Think About Me”,”Sara”,”That’s All for Everyone”,”Sisters of the Moon”,”Angel”, the best “B” side ever “Silver Springs”, and the avant garde but infectious title song “Tusk” featuring the USC marching band!
Imagine an entire season of the tv “reality series” show Survivor if it had been filmed in a locked down recording studio instead of a remote island, and with guitars instead of spears, and you have the story of Fleetwood Mac’s 1979 double opus Tusk. Lindsey Buckingham and Stevie Nicks bare their souls here in part one dealing with the phenomenon of superstardom in a post-Rumours world. –Redbeard 
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Fleetwood Mac- Spare Me a Little- Record Plant Sausalito 12-74
I can admit now that, not until she was officially credited on Future Games and Bare Trees, were we sure that the singer of “Spare Me a Little” was female! Simply astounding that the late Christine (Perfect) McVie was lending her songwriting, distinctive voice, organ, and piano sound to Fleetwood Mac here, and continued over almost forty of the next fifty years. Christine died in late November at age 79. –Redbeard
Above L-R John McVie, Mick Fleetwood, the late Bob Welch & Christine McVie.
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Fleetwood Mac- Rumours- Stevie Nicks, Mick Fleetwood, Lindsey Buckingham
When assembling your album shortlist for that Seventies time capsule, better reserve space for the February 1977 release Rumours by Fleetwood Mac. And you can measure its merit any way you choose: quality of songs; sheer number of quality songs; stellar sound production,; musicianship; awards, sales. Holy cow, the worldwide sales are estimated now at 45,000,000 copies!!! Rumours was like a Fleetwood Mac greatest hits album unto itself, with “Second Hand News”,”Dreams”,”Never Going Back Again”,”Don’t Stop”,”Go Your Own Way”…and that’s just side one. Band co-founder Mick Fleetwood, chanteuse Stevie Nicks, and prodigal picker Lindsey Buckingham all join me here In the Studio for Fleetwood Mac Rumours.When California musical duo (and lovers) Lindsey Buckingham and Stevie Nicks joined British blues-rock veteran band Fleetwood Mac, their first collaboration in 1975 (their “white album” ) sold more copies than any previous album in the long history of their label. No one was in any way prepared for this new line-up’s stunning initial success, so you can imagine the in-house anticipation for Fleetwood Mac’s next effort.
They had to wait a full year for it, however, as four of the five members were breaking up literally in the studio while Rumours was being recorded. Fleetwood Mac co-founder drummer Mick Fleetwood joins Lindsey Buckingham and Stevie Nicks with me In The Studio for one of history’s most popular albums ever at an estimated forty million sold worldwide, an album that Rolling Stone magazine ranks at #25 on their Top 500 All Time list. Thanks to band co-founder Mick Fleetwood himself for providing some musical mirth to perilous times here with how rock’n’roll can adjust to social distancing. “I’d rather be six feet apart than six feet under.” –Redbeard
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Lindsey Buckingham- Best Of
The Best of Lindsey Buckingham apart from his Fleetwood Mac output, starting with his very first solo album, Law and Order, allows us to share my 2006 deep dive conversation. As a seeking, searching, growing musician, Lindsey Buckingham knows firsthand what David Bowie once described to me as “the tyranny of the mainstream.” For two days, Buckingham and I sat in a small windowless studio serving as his confessional, his therapeutic safe space, and we did not leave until Lindsey told me his truth about playing the role of Vincent in the real-life Van Gogh soap opera that has been much of his life and musical career.Two significant things have transpired since this very revealing classic rock interview: Buckingham has recovered from serious open heart surgery and subsequent vocal chord damage from intubation in early 2019, after being dismissed from longtime band Fleetwood Mac in a public spat the year prior. But only the health scare was a first for the singer/songwriter/guitarist/producer. My In the Studio rare in-depth conversation with the very private Lindsey Buckingham begins with his growing up in a highly competitive Northern California family of over-achievers (his older brother was on the US Olympic swim team); developing his musical chops with his high school transfer classmate Stephanie Nicks; and together moving to Los Angeles for their first shot at recording the tasty but ill-fated Buckingham Nicks album in 1973.
After being unceremoniously dropped from their record label, the star-crossed opportunity which miraculously appeared with a veteran British band recently relocated to LA, Fleetwood Mac; “Trouble” from his first foray solo on 1981’s Law and Order; the infectious title song from Go Insane in 1984; “Countdown” from Out of the Cradle in 1992; and the fourteen year layoff effort Under the Skin from Lindsey Buckingham in 2006 which included “Show You How”. Bonus chestnuts include the singalong “Holiday Road” from National Lampoon’s Vacation, and one of the later songs, “I Don’t Mind”. 
Lindsey Buckingham made breathless headlines in 2018 by being fired from Fleetwood Mac, but us longtime watchers of that never-ending Mexican telenovella know well that, for over a forty year period now, Buckingham’s role has resembled Al Pacino’s mafia Don Corleone character in Godfather 3 exclaiming, “Every time I think I’m out, they pull me back in!” So before you get to feeling too sorry for Lindsey for being summarily dismissed and are tempted to start a GoFundMe page for him, realize that it is quite possible that getting sacked may have been the only way out of his contractual obligation to the Big Mac tour. And who knows? Maybe the old Br’er Rabbit routine was the best way out of a bad situation for Buckingham, who has put the free time to great use by collecting the best of his solo albums Law and Order, Go Insane, Out of the Cradle, Under the Skin, Gift of Screws,and Seeds We Sow with live performances and even a couple of previously unreleased songs into Solo Anthology- The Best of Lindsey Buckingham. –Redbeard
(And coming in September 2025!!!) -
Buckingham Nicks- Crystal 1973
This version of “Crystal” will sound uncannily familiar to millions of Fleetwood Mac fans, yet those same people will swear that they have never seen or heard the 1973 album Buckingham Nicks. And of course they are absolutely correct. The next time somebody professes that “Everything’s now available on CD or digital “, you can burst their bubble by offering up Exhibit “A”, the sole 1973 album by Lindsey Buckingham and Stephanie “Stevie” Nicks. How rare is a copy? Well, while interviewing Stevie Nicks in her bedroom at “The Castle” off Hollywood Boulevard, when asked she told me that she did not even own a copy of the record at the time! And it has never come out, legally, on any digital format including compact disc. –Redbeard
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Crowded House- It’s Only Natural- Los Angeles July 2010
Ten years ago “It’s Only Natural” that Aussie all-stars Crowded House would want to celebrate. It was the twenty-fifth anniversary of the brilliantly eclectic, melodic quartet and they had a new studio album, Intriguer, dropping as well, so they embarked on a world tour.
That Crowded House 2010 album Intriguer went straight to the #1 selling spot in Australia, which probably comes as no surprise to anyone with even a basic knowledge of the band’s long career from the Finn Brothers Neil and Tim’s beginnings with Split Enz in New Zealand. But that chauvinism doesn’t explain away Intriguer‘s #12 sales in the UK that year.
It was bittersweet for us rabid Crowded Housers when, in 2018, Neil Finn was tapped to join Fleetwood Mac to sing and write songs in the absence of Lindsey Buckingham. We were all thrilled of the validation the invitation afforded Neil as one of the finest pop songwriters this side of Paul McCartney; the forum for his talents and the payday fronting the Big Mac that the opportunity presents. But we also knew inherently the threat to Crowded House it presented, so I for one am thrilled to learn that Finn, Nick Seymour, and Mitchell Froom are working on the next Crowded House album! –Redbeard