Wednesday 11 November 2009

Fleetwood Mac - Sounds Write


WHEN guitarist Fleetwood Mac , singer and principal songwriter Lindsey Buckingham told the audience at Manchester’s M.E.N arena that, “This band have a complex and convoluted emotional history and it has not always been easy”, the comment was undoubtedly one of the understatements of the century. If for the forty year plus rollercoaster life and times of the supergroup were ever to be dramatised, it would certainly make for the most compelling viewing with its tales of marital splits, inter band affairs, acrimonious bust ups, casual bed-hopping, copious amounts of drug taking/life threatening addictions, alcohol abuse, mental illness, therapy and rehab, flirtations with religious cults and all this whilst simultaneously managing to create some of the finest and biggest selling albums of all time.
The fact that Fleetwood Mac in 2009 are now, seemingly, the most stable of units is nothing short of a phenomenon and a testament to their individual and collective survival instincts. Messrs Buckingham, Stevie Nicks, Mick Fleetwood and John McVie (Christine McVie quit the band in ’98, opting for a quiet life these days down in Kent) have long since cleaned up their acts and settled their personal differences and, on the recent ‘Unleashed’ world tour which rolled up in Manchester last week for a sell out show, they convincingly demonstrated that their performance levels are as high now as any point previously in their lengthy career.
In the early 1970’s, Fleetwood Mac were a British blues/rock group whose moderately successful career up to that juncture had been seriously derailed by the departure(due largely to one too many bad acid ‘trips’) of founder member, legendary guitarist Peter Green. The group continued to splutter along for a while until the pivotal moment when an American duo, Buckingham and Nicks, joined the band. Lindsey Buckingham and Stevie Nicks were lovers as well as performers and came very much as a package, with Buckingham, having been identified as a replacement for Green(after a succession of other players had not worked out), refusing to join Mac unless his partner came ‘on board’ too. The introduction of the duo in 1975, who had previously been bit part players on the West Coast music scene, struggling to eke out a living, succeeded in adding a radio friendly sheen to Fleetwood Mac’s blue/rock roots, turning around their fortunes in the process and completely revitalising the group’s career. The now new look Anglo American Fleetwood Mac embarked on a glorious period of unbroken musical success throughout the remainder of the 1970’s/early 80’s but the new chapter in the group’s history also heralded the start of those well-documented problems that very nearly destroyed the band.
The 2009 ‘Unleashed’ tour has a real celebratory triumph over adversity feel to it and the crowd pleasing tone of the evening was set in place from the very moment Stevie Nicks and Lindsey Buckingham walked out on stage hand in hand to thunderous squeals of delight. And in truth, the two and a half hour show that followed did very much belong to the duo who were undeniably the main focal point with their great on stage dynamic.
Fleetwood Mac don’t presently have any new album to promote, their last one being 2003’s ‘Say You Will’, though they did hint during the show that there could well be one in the offing, news that was met with great audience excitement. The set list of the recent show is drawn largely from the group’s trilogy of 1970’s albums, the self titled ‘Fleetwood Mac’, the 25 million plus selling ‘Rumours’ and ‘Tusk’, records which marked the band’s halcyon days. “This time we said, ‘let’s just go out and have fun’”, Buckingham told the crowd when explaining the show’s rationale and content and so, what was subsequently served up amounted to a veritable Fleetwood Mac musical feast for fans with great big dollops of classic songs such as ‘The Chain’, ‘Dreams’, ‘Rhiannon’, ‘Gold Dust Woman’, ‘Gypsy’, ‘Oh Well’ – a solitary doff of the hat to the Peter Green Mac era, ‘Never Going Back Again’ and ‘Second Hand News’, which Buckingham introduced, with another reference to their ‘crazy’ years, by saying, “This next song, if memory serves, and these days it often doesn’t serve, due to living one’s life a certain way for a number of years, was the first song written for the Rumours album.”
Buckingham himself is, physically, remarkably well preserved these days and with his boyish, skinny frame, still thick though greying mop of tousled hair, makes a mockery of his sixty years. As for his guitar playing, it is nothing short of dazzling and if anyone present had any doubts beforehand about him deserving to be ranked right up there alongside the greats, they would surely have left the building utterly convinced that he is indeed, a bona fide guitar maestro. He plays his instrument with a manic intensity, at times a picture of almost demonic intent and his spine tingling solo performance on acoustic guitar for ‘Big Love’ (from the ‘Tango In Night’ album) was something very special to behold, with his breakneck speed of hands building to an awesome finger shredding climax. Elsewhere, he turned in immense solos on ‘Tusk’ and ‘Go Your Own Way’, shamelessly playing up to the crowd with his whoops and stomping of feet as well as his frequent forays to the very edge of the stage where, on bended knee while soloing, he allowed fans to run their eager fingers all along his guitar fretboard. He still sings great too, possessing a natural flair for harmonising and he does all this, whilst visibly drenched right through in sweat from the second song in yet never once bothering to remove his short black leather jacket in a great display of ultimate rock star ‘cool’.
Miss Stevie Nicks, the perfect onstage foil for Buckingham, still sports her career ‘uniform’ of cropped style riding jacket complete with floaty shawl, billowing skirt, suede platform boots and (occasional)Victorian top hat whilst her mic stand and tambourine are draped with trademark sheer scarves and long ribbons. At sixty one, despite her years of hard living having clearly taken their toll on her looks and her once svelte figure certainly a little more rounded these days, Nicks remains effortlessly sexy and the epitome of Californian hippy/mystical chic. Her vocals however are her greatest seduction tool, as smoky and ethereal as ever and although she now noticeably avoids notes in the higher register, her dulcet tones still cast quite a spell.
There’s some lovely Buckingham/Nicks coming togethers’ during the show that are played out for maximum effect and which the audience readily lap up. A stunning Nicks rendition of ‘Landslide’ sees her alone on stage with her former paramour accompanying on acoustic guitar and, at the conclusion of ‘Sara’, the pair warmly embrace and hug, sway momentarily in each others arms with a resting of heads on shoulders and there’s a tender kiss from Buckingham to the back of Nicks’ hair. It’s all a little too stage managed but it’s a poignant moment nonetheless and elicits the intended crowd cheers.
As something of a backdrop to the Buckingham and Nick’s floor show, there’s the two ageing gents and somewhat unsung heroes of the group, bassist John McVie (64) and drummer Mick Fleetwood (62), driving things along at a frenetic pace as one of the tightest rhythm sections in the business. McVie, typically motionless and doing his best to avoid eye contact with all, hiding under his flat cap, could easily pass for a grizzled farmer that had just parked his tractor at the back and ambled on stage whilst the towering 6ft 6in Fleetwood, with his grey/white hair slicked back in a short ponytail, wild, wide-eyed gaze, white shirt and black waistcoat and, with those omni present, what appear to be, pair of oversized clackers dangling from his waist, looks for all his worth as though he has come straight out of the pages of an old English medieval novel. And when he gets his big moment under the spotlight during a fairly lengthy drum solo towards the show’s end, he goes into full on frenzy mode, battering the hell out of his monstrous kit as he barks out some incomprehensible words to the crowd and generally exhibiting characteristics of a deranged madman. The alln-absorbing and enthralling concert reaches a actual peak with everyone coaxed to their feet for the big crowd sing-a-long anthems that are ‘Go Your Own Way’ and the rousing encore of ‘Don’t Stop’. It leaves the audience on an exhilarating high and the final utterance from the stage of “We’ll see you next time” is a promise all present surely hope Fleetwood Mac will keep.

Thursday 5 November 2009

Birmingham, Fleetwood Max at the NIA


It is rare for a rumbling bass guitar it is rare riff to get one of the biggest cheers at a concert but it happened when John McVie played those famous notes of The Chain, introduced to a whole new audience thanks to their use as the theme tune to TV’s Grand Prix racing coverage.
And, just like an F1 car, Fleetwood Mac got off to a flying start as they took the audience on a Greatest Hits trip. The Chain, the second track of a 22 song set, was followed by Dreams and a rockin’ I Know I’m Not Wrong.
Frontman Lindsey Buckingham explained: “We’ve got no new album to sell so we’ve decided to do the songs we love – and we hope you love them too.”
While 60 year old Lindsey provides the hard edged rock ‘n’ roll, former girlfriend Stevie Nicks, a year his senior, enchants with her more ethereal tunes.
Rhiannon and Gold Dust Woman were highlights of the two hour 20 minute show, while at the end of Sara, Nicks and Buckingham hugged, a sign that time has healed the rift between them.
The duo may be in the spotlight at the front but the power is at the back of the stage in the shape of 63 year old McVie and towering 62 year old drummer Mick Fleetwood who provided the muscular rhythm for another show stopper, the mighty Tusk.
When it comes to guitar maestros, however, it’s hard to top Buckingham who played a blistering solo at the end of I’m So Afraid.
He has the stage to himself for Big Love, a song, he explains, that was written as an ensemble piece but has evolved into a solo performance.
Drummer Fleetwood encores with a madcap solo before a rip roaring finish of Don’t Stop which had the sold out crowd singing along.
The Mac are well and truly back.

Sunday 1 November 2009

Michael Jackson: This Is It, Kenny Ortega, 112 mins, (PG)


The biggest musical event this week isn't a concert at all, but it's coming to a popcorn pit near you. By the time I'm writing this and you're reading it, Michael Jackson was meant to have performed 27 dates of his This Is It farewell show at the O2 in London, with a further 23 to follow in the spring.
Whether you believe he would even have made it this far without cancellations is a matter for personal conjecture. And it's a question that the feature film, cobbled together from his rehearsals at Los Angeles' Staples Center, only hints at answering.
The Star Wars scroll-up at the start tells us that This Is It was going to be "an entirely new concert experience". Entirely new? Not exactly. A very high-concept version of the existing concert experience, perhaps. But it's typical of the uncritical hyperbole that defines and dogs this documentary.
The main problem with This Is It lies in its choice of director: Kenny Ortega, the director of the stage show itself, who has cherry-picked the clips which make his production appear in the best possible light.
It would, unquestionably, have been a cracking concert: the dancers who pop up from below-stage at toaster speed, the black widow spider from which Jacko emerges in "Thriller", the appearance of an actual bulldozer for "Earth Song", the Zelig/Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid-style film preceding "Smooth Criminal" in which MJ is placed inside a montage of film-noir scenes (admiring Rita Hayworth in Gilda, dodging Bogey's bullets in Dead Reckoning, and so on).
But had the footage fallen somehow into the hands of an impartial documentarian, we might have seen a completely different film from the hagiography Ortega has given us.
The most fascinating scenes, nevertheless, are the candid moments in which Michael, bespectacled and studious, chomping on snacks or sucking on a lollipop, supervises auditions, oversees choreography on his laptop, bosses the band (who all call him "Sir") into making it "more funky" and admonishes them for "not letting it simmer!", while emphasising that his criticisms are always delivered "with the love, L.O.V.E".
His face, it's sad to say, looks like someone who's been in a fire, but his physical condition isn't as poor as one might expect. The 50 year old was still super mobile, as the awe inspiring spin he throws into "The Way You Make Me Feel" proves, and his voice on "Human Nature" is out of this world. What he lacks, it seems, is stamina: he complains that he needs to save his voice rather than rehearse the outro of "Just Can't Stop Loving You", and can't hack a retake of the routine for "Beat It". Interestingly, the one character we never meet is Dr Conrad Murray, dosing Jacko up and pushing his body to the limit to meet AEG's concert schedule.
Despite the stress he's under, at no point does the King of Pop kick off, throw his toys out of pram or reach the end of his tether. Instead, he spends his down-time delivering a softly-spoken soliloquy on climate change. Maybe he actually is that saintly. We'll never know, because Ortega's sometimes inspiring, but mostly somewhat sad film is ultimately – no apologies for the pun – a whitewash.
If she didn't mean it, it wouldn't work. Stephanie Lynn Nicks may have been working as a waitress in a cocktail bar when Fleetwood Mac found her, and cleaning the producer's toilets to pay for her first record, but the buck-toothed blonde from Phoenix never stopped imagining herself as a Welsh witch goddess.
Thirty-five years on, she hasn't ceased: swishing about in a bat-winged cape and a diamante half-moon pendant, and bleating about a "woman taken by the sky". Mystery-and-magic isn't merely an act for Stevie. She believes it, and bless her to bits for that.
If Stevie on a British stage is what really sends the hackles tingling for the faithful, then it's only in the context of a truly stunning Fleetwood Mac concert. Her foil and sometime lover Lindsey Buckingham, spindly-legged and still offensively handsome, is a fast-fingertipped phenomenon on guitar. His solo spots for "Big Love" and "Oh Well" are breathtaking; the title track of his 1979 folly Tusk is so berserk you can almost taste the Hollywood A-grade in your septum.
Together, they conjure such an electricity that the rhythm section John McVie and Mick Fleetwood, whose British blues band was transformed by the Buckingham-Nicks takeover in 1974, can only stand and watch. "I think I had met my match," she sings in the sublime "Sara", and she looks at him with lazy eyes. He catches the glance, and bites his lip. As the song ends, they waltz and he kisses her hair. It must drive their current partners insane. Because it sure as hell sends a shiver through everyone else.