February 24, 1977 marked the start of Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours Tour, when the band performed the album written about everything. Rumours is Fleetwood Mac’s best selling album. It remains on Billboard’s Top 200 Albums today, after over four decades since it released. The success of Rumours is prevalent — the history behind the album and the tour that followed are what make Fleetwood Mac so unique.
The first layer of Rumours is dissected within the songwriting and the making of the album. Stevie Nicks and Lindsey Buckingham had the love story of a lifetime. Buckingham and Nicks were messily on and off during the writing of Rumours, while Christine McVie and bassist, John McVie, divorced by the end of the Rumours tour. Nicks then became involved in an affair with drummer Mick Fleetwood.
Rumours is brutally honest, raw and all too real, telling the different sides to each of the ex-lovers’ stories. Buckingham’s stab at Nicks on the album, “Go Your Own Way,” was not only released as the first single of the album, but also was sung on stage with backing vocals from Nicks herself.
“I very, very much resented him telling the world that ‘packing up, shacking up’ with different men was all I wanted to do,” Nicks told Rolling Stone in 1997. “He knew it wasn’t true. It was just an angry thing that he said. Every time those words would come out onstage, I wanted to go over and kill him. He knew it, so he really pushed my buttons through that. It was like, ‘I’ll make you suffer for leaving me.’ And I did.”
Each night, while not on talking terms, the band stood next to each other on stage playing songs written about each other, and that is Fleetwood Mac.
Stevie Nicks’ greatest stab at Buckingham, “Silver Springs,” was included on the deluxe version of Rumours. Lyrics aside, this would become best known from the footage from The Dance in 1997. Nicks passionately turns her microphone and looks at Lindsey, screaming the lyrics at him as if the song was not written 20 years prior to the performance. That specific performance was so intense that it was nominated for a Grammy. Although each individual band member went through it writing Rumours, Buckingham and Nicks have always remained at the front.
The members of the band left and reappeared throughout the years for various reasons, 2014-2015’s On with the Show being their last tour as a group of five. In 2018, they toured without Buckingham after scheduling conflicts. However, an interview with Rolling Stone speaking about the situation ensured that tension between Buckingham and Nicks remains evident.
The Rumours touring era shaped Fleetwood Mac. It served as a basis for their ability to stand alongside each other and put the band first. It fueled each member’s personal distress through the sole power of music and the satisfaction of knowing that the person who your words speak to is right there beside you singing along. It is the story of Rumours and the stage presence of Rumours that makes Fleetwood Mac the band that it is. After all, they “would never break the chain.”
Lauren Patterson is a freshman studying journalism. Please note that the views and ideas of columnists do not reflect those of The Post. Want to talk to Lauren? Tweet her @lpaatt.
