Latest / Booked On Rock with Eric Senich / Fleetwood Mac’s Fire: Passion, Pain, and the Pursuit of Artistry [Highlight From Episode 343]

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Fleetwood Mac’s Fire: Passion, Pain, and the Pursuit of Artistry [Highlight From Episode 343] · Booked On Rock with Eric Senich

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Here's a highlight from a recent episode of book. Don
• 0:02
  Speaker 1: Rock Alan Light is the author of Don't Stop. Why
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: We Still Love Fleetwood Macs Rumors You Make Loving Fun
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: is one of those songs that manages to win over
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  Speaker 1: even those who aren't Fleetwood Mac fans. Michaelangelo matos, Yes, right,
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: he has a great story about that.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, I love that story. Michael Achelow, who's a writer
• 0:20
  Speaker 2: in Minneapolis, talks about going to a party and somebody saying,
• 0:25
  Speaker 2: you know, I don't really get Fleetwood Mac. And he's like, no,
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  Speaker 2: you need to. You gotta, you gotta understand Fleetwood Mac.
• 0:32
  Speaker 2: And you gotta understand Fleetwood Mac, among other things. And
• 0:35
  Speaker 2: he's written a lot about dance music can be a
• 0:39
  Speaker 2: dance band, you know that these can be. There's you know,
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  Speaker 2: sort of a funky thing in some of these songs,
• 0:45
  Speaker 2: and puts on you Make Love and Fun and the
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  Speaker 2: guy hears that groove and here's that that baseline and
• 0:51
  Speaker 2: is like, oh, well, okay, you know, yeah, I get that.
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  Speaker 2: I can hear that, which is particularly fascinating because Christine
• 1:02
  Speaker 2: McVey writes that song about her new boyfriend who is
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  Speaker 2: the band's lighting director. Just to add to the chaos
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  Speaker 2: of all of this, and yet here's her ex husband
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  Speaker 2: playing the bassline that in some ways, you know, locks
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  Speaker 2: that song down, playing this fantastic bass part that gives
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  Speaker 2: it that propulsion, you know, that gives it that groove
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  Speaker 2: that he's got to sit there and play as she's
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  Speaker 2: singing about this new dude that she's seeing.
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  Speaker 1: Now unreal. I think it's just it's.
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  Speaker 2: Just none of it, you know, makes any sense at all.
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  Speaker 2: And yet this is, you know, this is what you're
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  Speaker 2: left with. It is it's all of these ingredients. And
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  Speaker 2: I think somebody makes the point that if you know
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  Speaker 2: the story and you know the story and you know
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  Speaker 2: the details, that's one thing. But even if you don't,
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  Speaker 2: you can hear these layers, this depth, this richness to
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  Speaker 2: whatever is going on in the studio. You feel that
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  Speaker 2: in these songs that there is a you know, they're
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  Speaker 2: just dimensions to these performances that are coming from someplace,
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  Speaker 2: are coming from emotions that are banging around in that room,
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  Speaker 2: and that are inescapable as you as you hear these songs.
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  Speaker 1: Maybe beyond the actual skills the musical talents is the
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  Speaker 1: fact that they were all able to step aside for
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  Speaker 1: the greater cause to be able to say, I'll just
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  Speaker 1: I will record a song with my ex wife talking
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  Speaker 1: about a guy as she's with, you know, and you know,
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  Speaker 1: just saying look I need Lindsay, he's driving me mad.
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  Speaker 1: I can't stand in mind, I don't want to be
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  Speaker 1: in the same room with him, but I get what
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  Speaker 1: he's what he's doing, his importance and vice versa, Lindsay.
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  Speaker 2: Who they say that. Look, you know, whatever was going on,
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  Speaker 2: we knew that these songs were something really special, that
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  Speaker 2: something was happening. And I think there's a quote from
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  Speaker 2: Stevie in the book where she's like, well, were we going
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  Speaker 2: to do like we were going to quit and go
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: start new bands? Like that would be stupid And talking
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  Speaker 2: to I talked to Cameron Crowe for the book, who
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  Speaker 2: wrote the famous Rolling Stone cover story that came out
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  Speaker 2: at the time, very famous cover photo of the five
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  Speaker 2: of them in bed together, and he said, look, they
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  Speaker 2: you know, obviously the tension was what it was, and
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  Speaker 2: the relationships, you know, what was happening was happening, but
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  Speaker 2: they also knew what they had and they were ready
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  Speaker 2: to put that out in the world. And knowing that
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  Speaker 2: they were going to mean from the album title on down.
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  Speaker 2: Knowing that leaning into this narrative and to all of
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  Speaker 2: the gossip column stuff and to everything that was happening,
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  Speaker 2: inescapably was going to be part of this story. And
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  Speaker 2: they were not resistant to that. They were not afraid
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  Speaker 2: of that. They knew that they had made something great.
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  Speaker 2: They were committed to these songs, and they were, you know,
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  Speaker 2: whatever it took, they were going to see.
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  Speaker 1: That through minds when an artist is putting it all
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  Speaker 1: into your art, into the work.
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  Speaker 2: You know, into these songs, singing because it's inconceivable, right,
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  Speaker 2: Stevie and Lindsay breakup, John and Christine get divorced, Mick
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  Speaker 2: and his wife get divorced, Mick and Stevie have an affair, right,
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  Speaker 2: Christine starts dating one of the crew. You know, all
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  Speaker 2: of this is happening, and yet they're showing up in
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  Speaker 2: the studio every day singing these songs, writing these songs,
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  Speaker 2: recording these songs about each other and about what they're
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  Speaker 2: going through and sitting there together working this stuff out.
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  Speaker 2: It is unimaginable what that was. And look, that's a story.
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  Speaker 2: You said. There was the behind the music. There was
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  Speaker 2: the Classic Albums episode. You know, ken Callay, who co
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  Speaker 2: produced the record. He wrote a book about it. There
• 4:50
  Speaker 2: was this this play Stereophonic last year that won the
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  Speaker 2: Tony for Best Play of the Year. That is a
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  Speaker 2: very very mildly fictional life version of the Rumor's story
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  Speaker 2: to a point that ken Klay ended up suing them,
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  Speaker 2: saying that too much of this was taken from his book,
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  Speaker 2: which it was. And yet you know, people still love
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  Speaker 2: this story, they still love what that is. I didn't
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  Speaker 2: need to write that book, you know. I needed to
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  Speaker 2: do enough of the context, do enough of you have
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  Speaker 2: to know what I'm talking about. But again, what I
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  Speaker 2: really wanted to look at was not just the making
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  Speaker 2: of story, but the after life, the legacy, and this
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  Speaker 2: endless popularity and why people keep turning to it over
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  Speaker 2: and over and over again. You know, you the story itself,
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  Speaker 2: we know, is astounding and weaves its way in through
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  Speaker 2: all this stuff. But there's but also there are places
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  Speaker 2: to turn to to be able to get that