NEIL’S MAC PACK
The Courier-mail
By Kathy McCabe
MICK Fleetwood believes the seed for Neil Finn to join the legendary Fleetwood Mac was planted more than 20 years ago.
Ahead of the first of four concerts in Sydney on their world farewell tour, the band’s co-founder said Finn was one of the first people he thought of when Lindsey Buckingham left the band last year.
After the bandmates decided to continue touring, Stevie Nicks, Christine McVie and John McVie enlisted former Tom Petty band member Mike Campbell to join them to play guitar.
And then Fleetwood suggested his “secret weapon” Finn, who he has become “incredibly close”, with their respective families sharing holidays in Auckland.
The drummer also played on their “family album”.
They first met when they were sitting next to each other at a Paul McCartney benefit at the Royal Albert Hall two decades ago and have continued to catch up at random events before forming their firm friendship.
“It’s huge, and it’s magical,” he said of the latest incarnation of the Mac.
“And this funny relationship that I had with Neil, neither of us knowing why it was that we have passed in the dark, so many times. And now we know.”
At the Live Nation Green Room event before the show, the famous drummer said he wouldn’t go into the details behind the separation between the band and Buckingham.
“Note that I’ve said it before, we were not happy, and that was really the crux of, of all the details that don’t need to be known,” he told the invited guests.
Fleetwood also reminded his fans about his other Australian friendships developed when he had a home in Mittagong, close to Jimmy Barnes’s old property.
“We called it Barnesville back in the day,” he said of the Southern Highlands town. Fleetwood credits the generational appeal of the band – and in particular their seminal Rumours record, which remains one of the best-selling vinyl records each year – to their musical integrity.
“And we put our heart into what we do. And we took a lot of trouble whenever we made our albums, and they translated into something that has become somewhat, if not extremely, timeless, which is about the biggest blessing an artist can have especially when you get into your 70s,” he said.
Fleetwood Mac began a four-night stand in Sydney last night and play at the Brisbane Entertainment Centre on August 20, 22 and 24.
‘It’s a love story really’: Mick Fleetwood and Stevie Nicks on wooing Neil Finn
Fleetwood Mac brought ‘secret weapon’ Finn into the fold after an ‘incredibly sad, incredibly challenging’ time
By Steph Harmon
The Guardian
Mick Fleetwood described Crowded House frontman Neil Finn as a “secret weapon” he held onto for two decades, before asking him to fly to Hawaii to audition for Fleetwood Mac.
In April 2018, it was announced that longstanding member Lindsey Buckingham would be leaving the band, to be replaced by Finn and Mike Campbell, the guitarist from Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers.
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