The new lineup of Fleetwood Mac, featuring Neil Finn and Heartbreakers guitarist Mike Campbell, has made its TV debut on the Ellen show playing The Chain and Gypsy. It somehow sounds both exactly how you’d expect Fleetwood Mac to sound with Neil Finn yet also surprisingly good.
Nice to see the Hep bopping along in the front row at 3:18.
Not right is it. Finn looks like he knows it too.
Yeah. Like I say I was pleasantly surprised but my expectations were rock bottom. He does look uncomfortable.
Something is missing, and I don’t mean the obvious. There’s just something not quite right. And Neil Finn does indeed look completely out of place. Lindsey Buckingham was this version of FM’s saviour from blandness, and brought an element of tension that just isn’t there on the strength of these performances. They look dangerously like their own tribute act.
Sounds great to me. Neil looks like he’s a bit nervous, understandably, but it’s 80% of the famous lineup with a better lead guitarist and equally good singer. I’d go! I think LB was much more a power in the studio though I can quite believe the stories that he became impossible to work with.
What makes Campbell a better guitarist, Twang? I quite like his playing, but I really love Buckingham’s. I find it a great mix of FM-friendly slick and reckless punk.
(I thought the clip was awful, btw. Missing Buckingham’s playing, but also his voice. Plus the Buckingham/Nicks chemistry.)
Fully agree oh handsome one. LB has his own style, cadence and is almost always melodic, appropriate and economic. What I see here is pentatonic widdling 101. Twang sir, you have a pernicious blindspot!
FWIW I thought it was pretty damn good, especially for a TV audience performance from a band all old enough to remember Life Before YouTube, and the pentatonic widdling from MC, whilst lyrically simpler, fitted just fine – in fact it had a slightly harder edge than the Buckingham take on the song, which I found a useful lift – it is after all only a few (economic) bars in the middle of the climactic break and benefits from extra ooomph.
Here you go, here’s the missing Buckingham/Nicks chemistry:
C2H6O + C17H21NO4
Mike Campbell is one of the best guitarists in the world because he always plays for the song and is extremely melodic. OK he had a bit of a blow there but that’s fine with me anyway. Listen to any Tom Petty track. LB did a good job but he wasn’t a great lead guitarist, indeed not really one at all. Good player and unique in his way but they clearly wanted a great lead player which they got. Apparently they will be doing more of the early/mid period stuff which MC will burn on.
We gonna be agree to disagree on that one, Twangster. I find Campbell’s playing nice, but pretty conservative. I imagine you know more about guitarism than me, on account of me knowing feck all really, but I’d describe Buckingham as one of the most interesting and, at times, most thrilling lead guitarists ever. Especially live. He shows such a strong awareness of the value of both the conventional and the unexpected.
Fair enough. Wouldn’t do if we all liked the same thing. I just watched this lot –
and frankly nothing blew me away, or got near to it. He clearly thinks he’s amazing, but I hear little of interest and much of it is very simplistic, albeit played with silly hat, silly little guitar and much gurning. Fair play, people like it!
But there’s much more to LB than solos…. his acoustic playing is superb (says a complete non guitarist whose musical ability extends to pressing the play button on a CD player).
Exhibit A
I’d agree. Excellent acoustic player, and terrific songwriter/singer. What FM have done is split his job description to get a great lead player and separately a singer.
Agree with pro-MC comments. He is why I though ‘interesting’ when it was announced.
But Finn, doesn’t work – sounds odd, bit off-key a few times.
With you 100%, Twang. MC is a great player, and I’ve never understood why LB is considered any more than functional.
Sounded fine to me. There’s a good chance Neil and Stevie might hit it off as songwriters. He’s a great collaborator and in particular did some great work with Wendy & Lisa early in his solo career.
Found Neil Finn a bit trebley for my liking but then I’m in a minority in never really being a fan of his voice. Dunno about uncomfortable wouldn’t expect him to do “the frontman” type performance in his first outing.
Wow, that wasn’t too great. Anyone want to buy my ticket for their Ottawa show in Nov?
Even tho’ I know the song, (and a good choice to introduce how the brand continues as an unbroken chain, if the rest of the lyrics don’t fit) but to my ears it sounded like an outtake from C,S,N,Y Deja Vu, a Croby-ish vocal and Stills-y guitar. Anyone else get that? More interesting than the same old same old. Who was the other guitarist at the back, next to the other girly singer?
Have a listen to this report on the performance.
https://youtu.be/xtLnLx1yIzw
Not bad as a tribute band
Utter shit as Fleetwood Mac though
I’d rather hear Mick Fleetwood’s blues band in his bar in Hawaii thank you
First gig in public and on Ellen’s show so very early days. I’d like them to go back to a harder edge and , afterall that is where Mick, John and Christine come fron.
How about some classic 1995 Mac…
If any Afterword Mac fan with a vinyl turntable hasn’t got the 1979-80 “In concert” album, I can certainly recommend that. It’s reasonably priced for a 3LP set, the live performances are excellent and not just re-runs of the studio versions, and of course the material from the Tusk/Rumours era is uniformly strong.
For non-vinyl enthusiasts, I’m pretty sure that the album is included in the deluxe reissue package of Tusk that came out a few years ago.
There’s a good live album on the Rumours reissue too.
There we do agree. Much better than the subsequent official live album.
Which one would that be? Their first live album, ‘Live’ (1980) has superlative vershes of Rhiannon, Landslide, Never Going Back Again, Not That Funny and even Oh Well.
The one I was referring to has a cover that looks a bit like the Tusk cover … but without the picture of the dog attacking someone’s leg …
Dog attacking? An attackdog asks if any of the musos on here know the series of chords/tuning required to convincingly play ‘Storms’ on a single instrument? (Guitar of course, not euphonium or owt like that).
This is an extra disc in the Rumours reissue called “Live, 1977 “Rumours” World Tour”. The notes show they are all from the US leg of the tour. Really good.
The third disc is out takes and demos.
Shouldn’t work, and for me it doesn’t. I’ve always been a huge Neil Finn fan, but he doesn’t fit in the Mac – if for no other reason than I’d spend every second waiting for him to wander off into the Crowded House catalogue. His voice just sounds wrong singing FM material.
I actually thought he might sing CH material. If Lindsay Buckingham isn’t there then don’t play his songs.
The extra guitar gives it a harder edge and the sound is generally finer, but that lineup of the Mac is all about the Buckingham-Nicks chemistry. It can’t fail to look like a tribute band. Also, I’m surprised no one mention Stevie missing a cue (I forgot to note he exact point; watch it again). I mean, how often has she done this song? And haven’t they been rehearsing in Hawaii since February?
But but…this is 50% of the original band and 80% of the one which had the hits. Nowhere near being a tribute band.
Listening to it again, I think Lyndsey’s voice is what’s missing most, more than his guitarism or anything else. It sounds flat without the force and bite of his voice, in harmony with Nicks.
I dare say they were offering a big bag of F-Off folding stuff to replace LB. Who’d say no to that? Just highlights how irreplaceable he was. About as convincing as replacing SN with that woman from Dollar.
Only 25%, surely @Twang…