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<\/span><\/p>\nFirst impressions of Mick Fleetwood are usually something like (to paraphrase the Harry Nilsson song): \u201cJesus Christ, you\u2019re tall.\u201d Fleetwood doesn\u2019t so much inhabit his swanky Berkeley Hotel suite as loom across the available space. From head toe, he\u2019s immaculately groomed: the silver hair, the Maui suntan, the crisp striped shirt and hand-stitched brown brogues are evidence of his post-psychedelic dandyism. His socks are box fresh and match his scarf. His trademark headwear \u2014 today it\u2019s a burnt orange cap \u2014 lies on the table underneath a CD copy of his band Fleetwood Mac\u2019s reissued Rumours<\/i> \u2014 the elephant in the room. His ponytail, a reminder of longer-haired days, is constantly teased, as are the opulent Native American bangles on his wrists. He offers water. \u201cUsually I\u2019d have got through half a bottle of good wine by now, but since we\u2019re about to go on tour I\u2019m trying to stay fit.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mick Fleetwood has been an American citizen since 2006. He\u2019s lived in California and Hawaii for 40 years, and understandably speaks with a transatlantic accent. Pleasingly, there\u2019s a detectable trace of West Country burr. He was born in Cornwall in 1947 and educated at a public school in Gloucestershire, at one of those institutions where six-of-the-best corporal punishment was the norm \u2014 the bat and the cane. No wonder he became a drummer \u2014 taken out on those tom-toms.<\/p>\n
Suggestions of a whistle-stop tour his life are met with: \u201cGo ahead. I\u2019ll talk about anything. As long as I can get through the jet-lag.\u201d<\/p>\n
Does he still see the old gang?<\/p>\n
\u201cPeter Green? Once in a while I\u2019ll ring him. I may do once you\u2019ve left. He doesn\u2019t know it and won\u2019t be expecting it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Fleetwood smiles as if to imply that maybe it won\u2019t be a pleasant surprise for Green. Mick once tried to manage his old Bluesbreakers and Fleetwood Mac bandmate in 1977, but was flummoxed by the guitarist\u2019s insistence that both his past and the music business in general had destroyed his life and sent him to psychiatric hell.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was hard to convince him he wasn\u2019t dealing with the devil.\u201d<\/p>\n
Fleetwood Mac\u2019s second guitarist from their early days, Jeremy Spencer, the joker in the pack who used to decorate the band\u2019s equipment with sex toys, remains in touch. \u201cHe lives in Ireland and he\u2019s making music again. His journey is well known. He\u2019s not with the Children Of God anymore but some other sect [The Family International]. He\u2019s in good humour, much like the old Jeremy before he got very strange.\u201d<\/p>\n
One-time teenage whizz-kid slide guitarist Danny Kirwan also fell off the rails. Just as Spencer flipped after taking mescaline in Los Angeles in 1971, Kirwan and Green are said to have taken dodgy acid at a commune in Munich a year earlier, although Danny\u2019s problems lay in the bottle.<\/p>\n
\u201cI have no contact with Danny. I\u2019m supposed to have fired him in 1972 [after Kirwan smashed his guitar in the dressing room and refused to perform], but I just told him: \u2018Enough is enough. You can\u2019t keep on destroying the soundboard and then watch your fellow band members dying the death.\u2019 We didn\u2019t realise Danny wasn\u2019t suited to this business. That wasn\u2019t obvious in the late-60s when he recorded with us but he became very unpredictable. We should have said no to him joining, because he was already an alcoholic. I don\u2019t know if that\u2019s ever been fixed. I hear from his ex-wife, and it\u2019s not good.\u201d<\/p>\n
Kirwan ended up thing in the St Mungo\u2019s hostel for homeless men in Endell Street in Central London. He wasn\u2019t the only casualty. Kirwan\u2019s replacement, Bob Weston, who played on the Mac albums Penguin<\/i> and Mystery To Me<\/i>, was famously sacked by Fleetwood in Nebraska after the drummer\u2019s discovery that Bob was having an affair with his then wife Jenny Boyd. He was found dead in a grubby flat in Brent Cross in January 2012.<\/p>\n
Mac\u2019s American guitarist Bob Welch whose resignation in 1984 facilitated the arrival of Lindsey Buckingham and Stevie Nicks, committed suicide six months later, shooting himself through the chest.<\/p>\n
Viewed in black and white, all of this makes the relationship break-up saga of Rumours<\/i> seem pretty tepid. It\u2019s a depressing past punctuated with sublime moments like Man Of The World<\/i>, Albatross<\/i> and the classic albums \u2014 Peter Green\u2019s Fleetwood Mac, Mr Wonderful<\/i> and Then Play On<\/i>. Mick prefers to accentuate the positive.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat old band came out of the hatch and we were immediately successful. We were very diverse, playing all that Elmore James blues and having hit singles. John McVie and me always welcomed the new people. We never told that they had to conform to any formula. It was amazing that we kept our audience. Peter was generous too. Even on his last album with us [Then Play On<\/i>] he gave Danny half the album to write. He didn\u2019t need to do that.\u201d<\/p>\n
The original Fleetwood Mac severed ties with Britain when they decamped to the USA in the early 70s. \u201cIn England we fell off the map, and a few years on we lost our identity with the massive mismanagement fiasco.\u201d<\/p>\n
He\u2019s referring to the bogus Fleetwood Mac of 1974, put together by then-manager Clifford Davis when the band were at an all-time low. Fleetwood has always denied any involvement with this outfit formed from the blues hand Stretch. \u201cWe suddenly found we were no longer in our own band!\u201d<\/p>\n
The faux Fleetwoods didn\u2019t survive a lawsuit, however, and Mick was amazed that \u201cWarner\u2019s didn\u2019t drop us. There were lots of ifs-and-buts. If Peter hadn\u2019t left and he\u2019d been emotionally on track. I honestly believe we\u2019d have been up there with Led Zeppelin and that thing that happened in America at the time. We were a funny-looking bunch of guys, but we were a phenomenally fucking good band.\u201d<\/p>\n
Lovers of the old Mac might say that here was the real tragedy \u2014 if that\u2019s not too strong a word.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey were tough times. It\u2019s funny how things happen. If Bob Welch hadn\u2019t left, we\u2019d never have made the next jump. But Danny was influential too; before him there was no melody and no harmony. And then there\u2019s this\u2026\u201d Mick gestures to the Rumours<\/i> package, the 40-million-selling gift that just keeps on giving. Now available in various permutations of CD, DVD and vinyl, the recorded stop opera that accompanied the splits between John and Christine McVie and Buckingham-Nicks refuses to go away. Here it is again, shipping 40,000 copies in the UK and forming the basis for a 50-date tour of America, followed by an autumn visit to European stages that will see an estimated box office and merchandise revenue pumping well in excess of $70 million into the group. Where did it all go wrong?<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s part of our legacy. We\u2019ve nurtured talent and they\u2019ve all left their mark, some more important than others. It\u2019s a big story, should you delve into how we got here. This album is interesting for us, if not a little frightening. How did we survive making it with all these ex-lovers blowing up in each other\u2019s faces? It was emotionally charged \u2014 cause and effect. We don\u2019t complain any more, and shouldn\u2019t, but dreadful things were happening. There were tragedies everywhere, with Peter and Danny, and then this album, where everyone is miserable.\u201d<\/p>\n
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<\/p>\n
A band waging war with itself may be deemed a vicarious pleasure, although the often physical nature of Lindsey and Stevie\u2019s disagreements were hard for Fleetwood to witness. During early rehearsals for Rumours <\/i>at the Producer\u2019s Workshop in LA, Mick saw his band disintegrating. Christine McVie was having an affair with the band\u2019s lighting director, Curry Grant. John McVie was perma-sozzle, and everyone was imbibing vast amounts of pharmaceutical cocaine dished out by the mirror-load. Meanwhile, Mick recited the lines of poet Robert Frost: \u201cThe woods are dark and deep\u2026 And miles to go before we sleep.\u201d<\/p>\n
The drummer still felt impelled to rally the troops, and was heard to implore: \u201cHey, guys, why don\u2019t we chill out here and do some transcending and just write music about all this hassle.\u201d<\/p>\n
These days Mick takes a more sanguine view.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe were only like every other band of that era. I\u2019ve given up all that now. John and Christine were\u2026 hmmm. Well, the whole band was at it. We weren\u2019t misjudged; we were in with the worst of them. But when I talk war stories with other bands, I think we weren\u2019t so bad. \u2018You did what?\u2019 We were lightweights compared to many. Look at the Stones or Johnny Cash, the stuff they took. We didn\u2019t do that, we were just boozers and mounds of cocaine. I thank God we didn\u2019t go to the opiate place. Cocaine eventually is bad, but we were still young kids. It didn\u2019t hamper us, it just meant we stayed up for three or four days and did some good music.\u201d<\/p>\n
The lingering aftermath saw them all go their own way into rehab and therapy, because there\u2019s no such thing as an ex-alcoholic or ex-drug addict. McVie eventually gave up drinking in the 1990s. Mick and Stevie Nicks both faced other battles. \u201cFifteen years after Rumours<\/i>, we were still going strong. And that wasn\u2019t fun. It turned out boring, and impossible for health reasons.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mick developed diabetes and thought he was dying of a brain tumour. Despite the apparent wealth generated by Rumours,<\/i>\u201d Tusk<\/i> et al, he declared himself bankrupt thanks to some disastrous property deals and failed restaurant endeavours.<\/p>\n
\u201cDid all that affect me? Yes it did. Stevie says she doesn\u2019t remember a whole 10 years of her life because she was doing weird stuff \u2014 she battled with tranquilliser dependency \u2014 but us rock\u2019n\u2019rollers have strong constitutions. We were lucky. Enough was enough.\u201d<\/p>\n
From a position of great health and wealth, Fleetwood is prepared to be candid. \u201cThe romance of it all is voyeuristic. People want to hear it, and I can talk about it. But looking back? No, it wasn\u2019t a great thing to have done. I\u2019m torn between not talking about it, which is defensive and stupid, or do I answer? We could cope because we were young. Is that the reason why we spent over a year making Rumours<\/i>? No, it wasn\u2019t. People said, \u2018Oh you\u2019re so indulgent.\u2019 But it was our money, our waste, and our drugs.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cOn a creative level we were thrilled because we were blessed to pay for studio time. We could have made a quick album \u2014 get the fuck out and hope they buy it anyway. People assume we were a depraved, drug-crazed group pissing money down the studio sink. No. We worked hard. The money was our advance \u2014 which we never saw again.\u201d<\/p>\n
In Mac\u2019s defence, it wasn\u2019t their fault Rumours<\/i> became a behemoth. \u201cWe had no idea. We lived in a focused world of five individuals. We weren\u2019t super-unique, but we were fairly unique because we forced ourselves into a one-on-one, 24\/7, pressing creative world. That\u2019s a lot to ask when every time you look at someone your heart is in your mouth, or you\u2019re feeling so hurt you just want to get a dagger and stick it in his or her back. That\u2019s what we were doing.\u201d<\/p>\n
Though often cast as the calming influence, Fleetwood felt as rotten as everyone else.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was miserable because my wife left me for my best friend [Weston] but I had to be the piggy in the middle. We were all fucked up. But you know my history: got to keep this band going at all costs. Someone had to do it, and it\u2019s in my nature. Maybe I\u2019m insecure. I get that from my dad.\u201d<\/p>\n
Fleetwood Mac isn\u2019t Mick\u2019s only family. He\u2019s the father of four daughters, two of them grown-up children from his 1970 marriage to Jenny Boyd, sister of Pattie Boyd, who was married to George Harrison and later Eric Clapton. Being George Harrison\u2019s brother-in-law gave him a unique insight into the extraordinary world of The Beatles circa 1969. He knew the Dutch hippie designers The Fool, who designed The Beatles\u2019 Apple shop and decorated stage sets for The Move, Cream and Procol Harum, and he\u2019d hear about the Beatles\u2019 trip to Rishikesh first-hand from Jenny, since she\u2019d sat at the Maharishi\u2019s feet with John, Paul, George and Ringo when she was with Donovan, who wrote Jennifer Juniper<\/i> in her honour.<\/p>\n
\u201cI had a vicarious window into the greatest talent pool I\u2019ll ever know. I went to the Abbey Road album sessions. I saw them doing Maxwell\u2019s Silver Hammer<\/i>, using the anvil and the horseshoes, and I spent a lot of time hanging by default in their Rolls-Royces or sitting down at tables in the Scotch Of St James. London was cooking then. I was just a little blues musician. To this day, Paul McCartney always calls me \u2018young Michael\u2019, and to George I was \u2018little Mick\u2019. Just before I got on the plane to come here, Jenny sent me a note George once gave her which had his Indian squiggle on it and a P.S: \u2018Don\u2019t forget to tell Mick that I love him.\u201d<\/p>\n
Given the overarching success of Rumours<\/i>, it\u2019s sometimes hard to remember that beneath the trappings, cosmic minstrel Mick Fleetwood is but a humble drummer, mentioned in dispatches rather than at the front line.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy reputation? I get checked a lot by fellow players. John Bonham\u2019s sister [Deborah] told me I was one of his favourite drummers. I thought he\u2019d think I was a piece of shit! Apparently not. The Fleetwood Mac rhythm section is better than we think, so I get kudos. I\u2019m a feel-meister, like Charlie Watts; I\u2019m not a technician. I don\u2019t know what I\u2019m doing half the time. But without puffing up, I\u2019m not an unknown personality. I\u2019m not the world\u2019s forgotten drummer. John McVie couldn\u2019t give a shit whether anyone likes him. He doesn\u2019t care about me as Mick the drama queen or Mick the flag-waver. His attitude is: \u2018How do you do all that? I couldn\u2019t give a shit. Phone me when they\u2019ve all stopped crying. It\u2019s pissing me off.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
McVie lives near Fleetwood on Maui and remains his friend and ally. They don\u2019t socialise that much, but the bass player will order him to take it easy, \u201cWhy are you operating another restaurant? Stop stressing out. Stop selling your soul for this thing.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI tell him: \u2018Why should you complain? I\u2019ve kept you in a band for 45years!\u2019\u201d Fleetwood says. \u201cHe appreciates that. My main function is creating the stage for me and John, so he\u2019d better.\u201d<\/p>\n
If Fleetwood Mac are now a nostalgia act, at least they didn\u2019t end up in Las Vegas. Christine McVic says she\u2019ll never come back, but there are three new tracks in the pipeline created by Fleetwood, Buckingham and Nicks \u2014 the latter pair being permanent road fixtures thanks to Stevie\u2019s touring schedule and Lindsey\u2019s One Man Show<\/i>. Making a band album is probably a thing of the past.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s all about the tour \u2014 a humongous tour that\u2019s gone ballistic. We\u2019re in good fettle. Stevie\u2019s in voice. Lindsey\u2019s fighting fit. I play a lot on Maui but I need to step it up. John only has to move his fingers.\u201d<\/p>\n
Ask him what his favorite Mac albums are and the man whose name is on the tin cites Tusk<\/i> \u2014\u00a0\u201cMore ground-breaking than Rumours<\/i>, and I know because I was managing the band at the time \u2014 and 1969\u2019s Then Play On<\/i>. I came up with the title, and it was a lovely creative mix. That album is the signpost of what could have been; a vision of the band if Peter hadn\u2019t been ill.\u201d<\/p>\n
He owns the original of the artwork used for the album. The painting, which features a naked man on a horse, is called Domesticated Mural Painting and is by the artist Maxwell Armfield. It was originally designed for a London mansion. Fleetwood admits that he misses the old days. \u201cThey were good times. Playing the Nag\u2019s Head in Battersea or out-of-town pubs in High Wycombe was like a fantastic boot camp. There\u2019s something about the slog that helps the creative ethic. Doing this tour is only plugging into a muscle memory; it\u2019s a psychic recollection of what I\u2019ve done my whole fucking life. Too many bands come out of nowhere and become rich and famous and unpleasant. They buy into the bullshit. I say: \u2018You need to go and set up an amplifier, jacko! Then drive to fucking Scotland and back for five quid.\u2019 I sound like an old fuddy duddy.\u201d<\/p>\n
While he\u2019s dishing out advice, Fleetwood mentions something that keeps him going. \u201cIn 1971, Tom Johnston, from the Doobie Brothers, and Steve Miller both told me: \u2018Play the colleges, whatever you do. Even if it\u2019s for peanuts.\u2019 That\u2019s what kept the band afloat in America in the early \u201870s. If we didn\u2019t draw a great crowd, I\u2019d pay the money back. Before that, in England, I learnt from Peter Green. He had Jewish blood so he knew how to tell people to fuck off \u2014 and give me the fucking money, you fucking liar. I went with him to die counting house after the gig, so I knew how tough he could be. But on a bad night Peter would give the guarantee back.<\/p>\n
\u201cA lot of my shit about running Fleetwood Mac comes from Peter Green. He taught how to recognise talent. He was the king of that band. All these individuals who turned up along the way were welcomed because Peter let me into the secret. Welcome to the realms of madness.\u2019<\/p>\n
And then play on. <\/i><\/p>\n
Rumours: The 35th Anniversary Edition it out now via Warner Bros.<\/i><\/p>\n
Thanks to Daniel at\u00a0http:\/\/stevienicksnews.net\/\u00a0for originally posting this article and allowing it to be re-posted here<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" By Max Bell Classic Rock April 2013 On the eve of Fleetwood Mac\u2019s UK tour to celebrate the 35th anniversary of their astonishing 40-million-selling album Rumours, we catch up with drummer Mick Fleetwood to find out how the band survived drink, drugs and affairs to record it. \u201cWe were all fucked up,\u201d he says. First … Continue reading Tall Stories I Classic Rock Magazine I Apr 2013<\/span>