Lindsey Buckingham and Christine McVie — alone at last.
Fleetwood Mac bandmates release their first duo album
Lindsey Buckingham and Christine McVie are going their own way.
No, they haven’t left Fleetwood Mac. In fact, they plan to be back with fellow bandmates Stevie Nicks, Mick Fleetwood and John McVie come spring, when rehearsals start for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame act’s next continenthopping tour.
But for now, at least, the two singer-songwriter-instrumentalists are concentrating on their own thing and have hit the road in support of their first duo album, descriptively titled “Lindsey Buckingham/Christine McVie.” The two stars perform Saturday at the City National Civic in San Jose.
It’s a project that, in some ways, was decades in the making, given that Buckingham says he’s felt a musical connection to McVie basically since the moment he (and his partner Nicks) joined Fleetwood Mac in 1974.
“From even before we started recording (1975’s ‘Fleetwood Mac’) album, when we went into rehearse, it was very obvious that there was a rapport that she and I had — a common ground that we had in terms of some sensibilities that maybe I didn’t so much share with Stevie,” says the Bay Area native during a recent phone interview from his home in Los Angeles. “Although, I had a very specific thing I could do for Stevie, in terms of opening up and bringing her songs to life.
“But there was obviously something I could do for Christine too, as a producer and as a conspirator in the process. That always was there.”
McVie also feels the bond.
“I just love working with him,” she says from her new home in London. “I think he brings out the best in me. And I — to some extent — bring out the best in him.”
So, what took them so long to collaborate? As Buckingham explains, there were some major obstacles during Fleetwood Mac’s wild and crazy commercial heyday of the ’70s.
“The politics were so convoluted from the get-go. She was still married to John (McVie). Things were sort of starting to become dysfunctional all around,” says Buckingham, who was in a relationship with Nicks at the time. “I don’t know if there has ever been another band that had two separate couples in it like that. And three out of the four of those people were the writers in the group. It was certainly a musical soap opera waiting to happen.
“I just think other things always displaced any sort of idea of Christine and myself concentrating on anything (musical), just the two of us.”
With Buckingham and Nicks onboard, Fleetwood Mac would become one of the biggest rock bands of all time, in large part due to the 1977 effort “Rumours,” which has reportedly sold more than 40 million copies to date. Yet, the band also had its share of problems, as the McVies’ marriage as well as Buckingham’s relationship with Nicks fell apart.
Christine McVie left the band in 1998. When she returned to the fold at the end of 2013, however, one of the first things she did was begin working with Buckingham in the studio. It didn’t take long for them to realize that the magic still existed and that this musical rapport they shared “was
better than ever,” Buckingham says.
The whole thing kind of took the two stars by surprise.
“We weren’t really thinking of making a record together,” McVie says. “It just turned out that way.”
They weren’t initially able to focus all their time on the project, since Fleetwood Mac had such a full agenda.
Reunited with McVie, the group quickly embarked on another tour, On With the Show, a mammoth 120-date trek that stretched some 14 months (in 2014-15) and took the crew all over the globe. The tour drew rave reviews from both critics and fans, who were clearly thrilled to see McVie back in the mix.
“When I kind of rejoined the band, I think it sort of rejuvenated the whole thing. I think people were just excited to see the five (of us) play again,” says McVie, who notes that things are still going well for the band. “Yeah, we’re going through a really good phase right now. And, it’s possible that won’t last forever — it can’t, you know?
“As long as we can do another couple of world tours — I definitely would think I would be too long in the tooth after that. But, still, you never know.”
Did she ever expect, way back during the crazy days of the ’70s, that Fleetwood Mac would still be around in 2017?
“Not a chance,” McVie admits. “I didn’t even think I would go back to Fleetwood Mac when I left. I thought I was retiring. I blew myself away when I decided to come back — and they wanted me back. Life’s a funny thing.”
Buckingham, of course, has done much touring outside of Fleetwood Mac. But being without the other three Mac members is still a pretty new experience for McVie.
“It was a little nervewracking to begin with, I suppose,” she says. “I’ve become quite easy with it now.
“We chat with each other onstage. We start the show with four kind of acoustic songs really. The backing band isn’t introduced until the fifth song.”
Besides playing tunes off the new album, the pair also has been performing a number of Fleetwood Mac favorites, such as “Tusk,” “You Make Loving Fun” and, most appropriately, “Go Your Own Way.”
“You’ve got to make everybody happy,” McVie says of playing the old hits. “I mean, if I was going to see the Stones, I would want to hear certain songs, and not have to wade through piles of new ones.”
The pair is looking forward to kicking off the second leg of their North American tour in San Jose. For Buckingham, it’s a homecoming.
“I grew up on the Peninsula in Atherton. That’s where Stevie and I met in high school,” says Buckingham, who attended Menlo Atherton. “Stevie and I (later) shared a house with a couple of people on Bascom Avenue (in Campbell) — a house that is gone now, but was across from the Pruneyard.
“Both my parents went to San Jose State. My great-great-grandfather, who came across the plains from St. Joseph, Missouri, in a covered wagon, was the first doctor in Santa Clara County — Benjamin Cory.”
He still has family — including a brother — in the area. It’ll be his first time performing at the Civic, but he did see some shows there back in the day.
“I think I even saw Chuck Berry there once,” he says.