Album of the Minute – Fleetwood Mac – Rumours
Aug 6, 2010 by Nick
If I handed you Rumours without telling you what album it was and had you listen to it there is a very good chance you would think I just handed you a greatest hits album. That is how good this album is. I don’t think there are a lot of albums you can say that about. The Cars first album comes to mind. Rumours is unlike any album I can think of because it is a band who is musically hitting on all cylinders while falling apart in every other way.
Just in case you have been living under a rock for about 30 or so years here is the short version of what was going on during the making of this album. Stevie Nicks and Lindsey Buckingham who had been dating for quite some time were going through a messy break up whil drummer Mick Fleetwood moved in and started having an affair with Stevie. Meanwhile Christine and John McVie were in the middle of going through a divorce. You might think this would be a good time for a band to take a break and get their shit together before heading into the studio to make an album. Or maybe it would even be a good time for the band to break up. That would not be the case.
The band was coming off of the self titled Fleetwood Mac release in 1975 and was feeling the pressure from the record company for a follow up record. So the band heads into the studio with all of this turmoil swirling around them combined with some heavy drug use by more than one member of the band and begin recording what would turn out to be one of the most successful albums of all time. Rumours has sold over 40 million copies as of today and the songs from the album are classic rock staples to this day.
The album starts of with the classic “Second Hand News” which features Lindsey Buckingham singing lead and Stevie Nicks singing some brilliant back up vocals and close harmonies with Lindsey. For me when Lindsey and Stevie are singing together that is when this band sounds the best. Buckingham also shines on the tunes “Never Going Back again”, “I Don’t Wanna Know”, “Go Your Own Way”, “Don’t Stop” and “The Chain” which were all written about the state of his relationship with Stevie. By the way I am a firm believer Buckingham is by far the most important member of this band no matter how many solo hits Nicks had in the 80′s.
Nicks shines herself on the classics “Dreams” and “Gold Dust Woman” where she references cocaine use which is not surprising since she was doing plenty of it during this album.
The album is rounded out by some very good songs where Christine McVie proves she is more than the keyboard player. “Songbird” is just McVie and a piano and sounds incredible. McVie also sounds great on “You Make Loving Fun” which was written about the guy she was seeing while divorcing her husband John. The irony in this song is that John lays down one nasty bass line to start the song off.
At the end of the day you have a band barely speaking with 3 lead singers and songwriters that could have had very successful solo careers on their own. You have drugs, breakups and all around dysfunction everywhere and somehow they come out with a masterpiece that sounds as good today as it did the day it was released. It was loaded with radio hits that have become staples of FM radio and probably will for a long time to come. When you think of great 70′s music this album should be one of the first you think of. If you do not own this album you need to fix that immediately.
Later,
Nick
Posted in Album of the Minute