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The real Stevie Nicks: The white witch of rock ‘n’ roll | Q Magazine (Oct 2013)

The real Stevie Nicks: The white witch of rock ‘n’ roll

Interview from 1997
Re-published in Q Magazine Oct 2013

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Stevie Nicks’s limousine is so huge that you can sit with your legs outstretched and still not bother the person in front of you. In this instance, it’s Nicks’s personal assistant, whose toes are about 12 inches from mine, and who’s eavesdropping on our interview and taking calls on what would now be a museum-piece mobile phone (this is the late ‘90s, after all).

We are on our way to an airstrip, where Fleetwood Mac’s private plane is waiting to take them to Buffalo, New York. Nicks is sat next to me, dressed in black despite the blazing sunshine, and sipping a concoction of lemon and honey from a glass tumbler. “Oh, I could easily fallen for John,” she purrs, over the faint hum of the car’s engine and air conditioning. She is talking about Fleetwood Mac’s bassist John McVie. “It’s those eyes,” she adds. Continue reading The real Stevie Nicks: The white witch of rock ‘n’ roll | Q Magazine (Oct 2013)

Mick Fleetwood: Excess all areas

The Sunday Times
18th Aug 2013
Matt Munday

Mick Fleetwood has survived nearly 50 years in rock’s most dysfunctional band, Fleetwood Mac. Now they’re back on the road

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Mick Fleetwood looks like a bohemian Santa with his bushy white beard, pastel shirt, black waistcoat and flat cap. Not all his tales from the rock’n’roll frontline are as jolly as his appearance, though. At one point he has to choke back tears of regret. He has lived a life of such abandon that he admits he is lucky to still be here. “I’ve inherited some good genes,” he explains.

It is often reported that Fleetwood put $8m of cocaine up his nose, and though this is an exaggeration, he says, if he hadn’t stopped consuming the drug so vigorously “the next stop would have been a wooden box”. His former bandmate in Fleetwood Mac, Christine McVie, had earlier told me that the men in the band used to rack out lines of coke like “blooming great rails” – whereas she and Stevie Nicks, the female contingent, would restrict themselves to “ladylike” portions, carried around their necks in jeweled buckles that had dainty silver spoons inside. “It was the 1970s,” she shrugged. “There was a lot going around.”

“I’m not advocating cocaine at all, but the truth is, I had a good time,” says Fleetwood. “But then, without realising it, you’re getting too out of it. You’re sleeping for three days, or you’re up for nine days or whatever. And eventually you don’t feel good at any time.” Continue reading Mick Fleetwood: Excess all areas

Fleetwood Mac – Sunday Night – Channel 7 – Yahoo!7 TV

Return of the Mac
Sunday Night Show Transcript
Sunday August 11, 2013
Reporter: Rahni Sadler
Producer: Dale Paget

CLICK HERE for story info and video.

Sex drugs and rock n’ roll: if ever there was a band that followed the mantra to the letter, it’s Fleetwood Mac.

Ahead of their Australian tour, the band are together for one special interview. The love triangles, the spiraling cocaine habits and other tales of rock star excess – nothing is off-limits. After more than four decades, see the reunion of all reunions.

MICK: Everyone on that stage has really fulfilled their dream from when they were really young to do this and we’re still doing this at this level. We’re still actually finding new chapters that are opening for us as people and musicians.

RAHNI: How does it feel when you walk out onto a stage and everybody is going nuts and stamping the ground? You’re walking out hand in hand with Lindsay.

STEVIE: I feel like I did when I first met him and started to sing with him because I knew, I knew that Lindsay and Stevie were going places.

RAHNI: Fleetwood Mac’s celebrated rock’n’roll story of love, hate and hit records has come full circle.

STEVIE: It is, in many ways, one of the greatest love stories ever told. It’s like one of those great romances of the century.

MICK: We’re all ex-lovers, so it’s just not cut and dry.

STEVIE: It’s a relationship that spans centuries and has come out on top.

RAHNI: For more than 30 years, Stevie Nicks and Lindsay Buckingham played together, but hardly spoke.

STEVIE: We both tried to kill each other.

RAHNI: Now they’re back.

STEVIE: It reminds me of the ’70s. It reminds me of the early days when we first started. Continue reading Fleetwood Mac – Sunday Night – Channel 7 – Yahoo!7 TV

Brit Music: Lindsey Buckingham

Anglotopia.com
July 29, 2013 By 

Fleetwood Mac released their first new material in a decade in the form of their imaginatively-titled extended play, “Extended Play.” And if Lindsey Buckingham is any indication, there will be more to come.

 

 

Quote Buckingham: “It’s safe to say there is more than these four songs that you’re going to hear from Fleetwood Mac. It’s just a question of how and when, you know? When I was growing up, EPs were all over the place. When I was growing up, albums were not really an art form; the single was the thing, and in some ways it has gotten back to that a little bit. The whole thing is just kind of wide open now, and it really is tantalising to be able to put together just a few things, three or four songs on an EP. There is something quite effective about that, for sure. I have no preconceptions one way or the other in terms of what Fleetwood Mac will do or even what Fleetwood Mac should do. You just do what you can do and what makes sense logically – and politically.Buckingham continued to insist that Christine McVie, who hasn’t been part of the group since 1998, will not rejoin, but she did spend time at a dinner in LA.

Quote Buckingham: “It was a trip, because she was the same old person I’d always known, and she was cracking me up. We’d always had just a great chemistry, the two of us, and we just kind of hit the ground running as soon as I saw her, which was kind of amazing. If she wants to come up and do ‘Don’t Stop’ with us when we’re in England, I’d love to see that. But beyond that I think there’s not too much you can make out of it – although I’m sure people will try.”

FLEETWOOD MAC “Lindsey Buckingham is an Insecure Man”

Classic Rock Magazine – Summer 2013
Words John-Paul Heck

They’ve had their share of highs and lows, but rock’s most dysfunctional band will be reeling back the years on their first tour in four years.

FM-group_ClassicRock2013In the 35th anniversary of Rumours this year. Are you bored of being asked about it?
Mick Fleetwood: I don’t mind, Rumours was our passport to success. Suddenly we were rich, It gave us the opportunity to make many more albums. Rumours also made us immortal. Nobody talks about The Moody Blues or other good bands like that any more. But if you go to a Fleetwood Mac concert will see hordes of young people singing along, really knowing every song.

For some people, Tusk is actually the great Fleetwood Mac album„ Fair go say?
I see Rumours as the banner which we still wave around the world, but Tusk was a more exciting album. But making it was perhaps even more difficult. It turned out to be a painful and tedious process. But we had seen the bottom. After Rumours it couldn’t get more extreme, Rumours trained us to survive.

Continue reading FLEETWOOD MAC “Lindsey Buckingham is an Insecure Man”

Depeche Mode, Fleetwood Mac and Elbow Michael Eavis’ choices for Glasto 2014?

Gigwise

by Adam Tait

Organiser already has headliners picked out

It might only be a week since Glastonbury Festival 2013, but there are already rumours that organiser Michael Eavis has locked down who he wants to headline in 2014 – with Fleetwood Mac, Depeche Mode and Elbow the suggested headlines.

Home of festival related rumours eFestivals say the organiser has already picked who will top the Pyramid stage, but that he won’t make bands put pen to paper until autumn 2013.

But even though he might wait to make the groups sign on the dotted line, Eavis is allegedly adamant about his selection of groups

The full eFestivals report reads: “Whether these two acts will be headlining Glastonbury 2014 we cannot tell you with any certainty, because our understanding is that nothing has been contracted as yet and things often change in the months that pass between a loose verbal agreement and signed contracts(normally in the autumn)… but we’re about as certain as we ever get that Elbow, Fleetwood Mac and Depeche Mode are the three bands Michael Eavis was referring to many months ago when he said he had he 2014 headliners sorted.”

Fleetwood Mac were early favourites to appear at 2013’s festival

Next year’s Glastonbury hits Worthy Farm on June 25-29. A recent Gigwise Poll saw Muse voted readers’ favourites to headline next year’s festival, beating David Bowie and Radiohead.

This year’s festival, held last weekend, saw headline slots from Arctic Monkeys, The Rolling Stones and Mumford and Sons.

10 tidbits about Fleetwood Mac’s Stevie Nicks – The Sacramento Bee

The Sacramento Bee
By Carla Meyer
Published: Friday, Jul. 5, 2013 – 12:00 am

Here’s a sobering fact: Stevie Nicks is 65.

Jason DeCrow / Jason DeCrow/ Invision/ AP
Jason DeCrow / Jason DeCrow/ Invision/ AP

Everyone’s favorite witchy woman has ushered her crystal visions, white-winged doves and fringed tambourines into early senior citizenhood.

But she has not slowed down, or rather, further slowed down while spinning at a deliberate speed to better display her shawl.

Nicks looks like she’s in her mid-50s, tops, and she still tours with Fleetwood Mac (minus Christine McVie, for purists), performing Saturday at Sacramento’s Sleep Train Arena. Continue reading 10 tidbits about Fleetwood Mac’s Stevie Nicks – The Sacramento Bee

Fleetwood Mac says: ‘Don’t stop’

San Diego U T
By George Varga
4:56 P.M.  JULY 3, 2013

It’s been a turbulent ride, but the group is back. “We are the kind of people who don’t all belong in the same band together,’ says Lindsey Buckingham.

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It’s been 39 years since Lindsey Buckingham and his then-girlfriend, Stevie Nicks, joined Mick Fleetwood and John and Christine McVie in Fleetwood Mac.

Faster than you can say “Landslide,” the 8-year-old English blues-rock band and its two new American members shifted gears, changed musical styles and soared to international pop stardom. The 1975 album “Fleetwood Mac” was the group’s first release to top the U.S. charts, while its 1977 masterpiece “Rumours” has now sold more than 40 million copies worldwide and yielded such enduring hits as “Don’t Stop” and “Go Your Own Way.”

Did Buckingham ever imagine then that the band would still be active in 2013 and embarked on a world tour, which includes a Friday stop here at San Diego State University’s Viejas Arena?

“Well, time kind of slips by and it doesn’t seem that long,” said the veteran guitarist and singer-songwriter, speaking from a recent tour stop in Boston. “You know, when you’re in your 20s and contemplating that (long an) amount of time, you think: ‘Gee, will I even still be alive by then?’ So, it’s all kind of relative to your perspective. And it certainly is a surprise, although there are bands that have managed to stick around that long.

“The one thing that probably would have disabused me from thinking then that we’d still be around now is that the chemistry was always so volatile. Not just because there were two couples in Fleetwood Mac who had broken up (before ‘Rumours’ was completed), and that whole subtext, but from the point of view that we are the kind of people who don’t all belong in the same band together.” Continue reading Fleetwood Mac says: ‘Don’t stop’

Fleetwood Mac’s Buckingham Nicks to re-issue rare album?

Published Wednesday, Jul 3 2013, 18:28 BST  |  By Tom Eames
Digital Spy

Fleetwood Mac’s Stevie Nicks has revealed plans to re-issue her debut album with bandmate Lindsey Buckingham.

Before joining the band in 1974, the former lovers recorded a single album under the name Buckingham Nicks in 1973.

However, it has remained out of print for many years and has not seen an official release on CD or download.

Nicks told Rolling Stone: “I went into Lindsey’s house two weeks ago and spent four days there. We recorded a very old Buckingham Nicks song that we loved and couldn’t figure out why it didn’t go on the album. It got brushed under the carpet somehow. We recorded it, so that’s a third song.

“[2013] is the 40th anniversary of Buckingham Nicks, and we’re hoping next year to get the record out. Then we’ll take that lost song and put it on the record.

“That’s kind of exciting, though it doesn’t have anything to do with Fleetwood Mac. People have been waiting forever for that record to come back out. Fleetwood Mac is totally good with us doing that. They know.”

She continued: “It was great spending time with Linds. We’re old enough now that we’ve laid down our weapons. We started this whole thing in 1968 and we’re proud of what we’ve done. We look at each other in a slightly different light now. It’s a good light.”

When asked if they might release a deluxe edition box set of the album, she said: “It is the 40th anniversary, because it was released in 1973. We have this new version of an old demo.

“So, we should put the album back out, and if we can make that happen then Buckingham Nicks should go out on the road next year. It would be great to do it in the 40th anniversary year. This might not just be the year of Fleetwood Mac, but we might throw in the Buckingham Nicks album for a special, sparkly, extra present.”

On whether they may fully reform as a duo on tour, she added: “There’s always a possibility. That is a situation where we would actually go on stage and do the complete Buckingham Nicks album.

“It would be a trip to bring it back with Waddy Wachtel and some other people from San Francisco. It would be trippy for Lindsey and I to revisit those songs.”

Fleetwood Mac released a new Extended Play collection earlier this year

Fleetwood Mac’s back with a love-fest vibe

Pop and Hiss
The L.A Times Music Blog
By Randy Lewis
July 3, 2013, 7:30 a.m.

For a notoriously perfectionist band like Fleetwood Mac, it shouldn’t come as a big surprise that its live show leaves nothing to chance.

John McVie and Stevie Nicks of Fleetwood Mac perform at the Prudential Center on April 24, 2013 in Newark, New Jersey.
John McVie and Stevie Nicks of Fleetwood Mac perform at the Prudential Center on April 24, 2013 in Newark, New Jersey. (Brian Killian, Getty Images / April 24, 2013)

Fleetwood Mac’s 2013 tour, which wraps up with a final run of shows this week in California, is built around a song list that’s gone virtually unchanged since the concert run began in April.

“We’re not one of those bands that throws the names of all their songs in a hat and pulls them out right before they go on stage,” guitarist, songwriter and singer Lindsey Buckingham said last week from a tour stop in Charlotte, N.C. (Buckingham and the band play Staples Center Wednesday.) “Years ago I was hanging out with Peter Buck and went to several shows R.E.M. did and they literally did just that. That’s one end of the spectrum.

“We’ve always had the sensibility that you work on the set and you structure it, much like a play, where once you’ve got the lines down and blocking right, you freeze it, and then you go out and do what you’re doing night after night,” he said. “You want to structure something that has form and that builds the right dynamic from start to finish.”

This time out that set list runs from “Second Hand News,” the “Rumours” opening track that serves the same function on this tour, through cornerstone hits including “”Rhiannon,” “Gold Dust Woman” and “Go Your Own Way” that are interspersed with deeper tracks such as “Not That Funny,” “Eyes of the World” and “I’m So Afraid.”

When it comes to touring, the group stresses a sense of stability onstage that rarely existed for the members off stage. The group famously channeled feelings unleashed by the disintegrating relationship of Buckingham and Stevie Nicks as well as the failing marriage of John and Christine McVie into the songs that catapulted “Rumours” and the band into the commercial stratosphere. Ever since, interpersonal dynamics have been nearly as big a part of Fleetwood Mac’s history as the music it made. Continue reading Fleetwood Mac’s back with a love-fest vibe