REVIEW Fleetwood Mac Live in Atlanta March 3, 2019

CONCERT REVIEW: Minus Lindsey Buckingham, Fleetwood Mac returns to Atlanta with energetic replacements
By Rodney Ho AJC.com

Given how tumultuous life was for the five core members of Fleetwood Mac when it was a hit-making machine from 1975 to 1987, it was a miracle to see them all together again in 2014.

When they arrived at what was then Philips Arena late that year, the band was rejuvenated, everyone just thrilled to have captured the magic again. After Christine McVie sang “Songbird,” the band members spent several minutes on stage talking to the exiting audience about how amazing it was to have McVie back after 16 years. 

But those positive vibes didn’t endure. 

REVIEW Fleetwood Mac Live in Nashville, TN February 27, 2019

Around the Water Cooler: Dreams and the gypsy that remains
By Andrea Agardy - Tullahomanews
Photos Zach Birdsong

Some little girls dream about being princesses when they grow up. Others want to be astronauts or Wonder Woman or CEOs of enormous tech companies. As for me? I wanted to be Stevie Nicks.

When I was about 8 years old, I was flipping channels one day after school when I stumbled across the video for “Stand Back,” Nicks’ 1983 solo hit. In less than five minutes, my ambition to be a tap dancing brain surgeon (that’s a story for another day) evaporated. The only thing I wanted to do was wrap myself in lace and fringe and spin, spin, spin while a fan dramatically blew my hair like I was living in a shampoo commercial.

And that’s exactly what I did. Well, as nearly as I could manage as a kid in New Jersey. A blanket became my shawl, I snuck one of my mom’s round cake pans out of the kitchen to use as a makeshift tambourine and headed to my bedroom, where I put the radio on and twirled until I was dizzy.

Stevie was captivating. And glamourous. And bold. And ethereal. And that voice, oh my goodness, that voice! Smoky, a little husky and maybe even a touch nasal, but unmistakable and absolutely one of a kind.

RECORD STORE DAY 2019 Fleetwood Mac - Fleetwood Mac Alternate

Record Store Day April 13, 2019

Format: 180g Black Vinyl LP
Label: Rhino

Originally released in 1975, Fleetwood Mac' s self-titled release marked the addition of Lindsey Buckingham and Stevie Nicks into the band' s line-up. Earlier this year it was reissued deluxe edition, featuring previously unreleased alternate recordings. Following the format of previous Fleetwood Mac RSD releases (for Tusk, Mirage and Tango In The Night), this RSD we will release a 1LP album of alternate takes mirroring the original album, from the "Fleetwood Mac" deluxe edition. Alternate takes include early versions of "Monday Morning", "Landslide", "Rhiannon" and "World Turning". On vinyl for the very first time. 

Tracklisting:
1. MONDAY MORNING (Early Take),
2. WARM WAYS (Early Take),
3. BLUE LETTER (Early Take),
4. RHIANNON (Early Take),
5. OVER MY HEAD (Early Take),
6. CRYSTAL (Early Version),
7. SAY YOU LOVE ME (Early Version),
8. LANDSLIDE (Early Version),
9. WORLD TURNING (Early Version),
10. SUGAR DADDY (Early Take),
11. I' M SO AFRAID (Early Version)

REVIEW Fleetwood Mac Live in Nashville, TN February 27, 2019

The new Fleetwood Mac finds its groove at Nashville concert
Dave Paulson, Nashville Tennessean
Photos Larry McCormack - view more at The Tennessean

If you attended Fleetwood Mac’s last concert in Nashville back in 2015, there’s at least one moment that probably stuck with you.

In the middle of performing “Landslide,” Stevie Nicks and Lindsey Buckingham paused for a moment and held hands. The crowd roared at the gesture, knowing these two had weathered more than 40 years of ups and downs together, both personal and professional.

That audience would have cheered even more loudly if they'd known how the next few years were going to go.

Ahead of the legendary rock band’s latest tour — which stopped at Nashville’s Bridgestone Arena on Wednesday — Buckingham and the rest of the band acrimoniously parted ways.

In concert, his absence is impossible to ignore (unless you’re the members of Fleetwood Mac, who didn’t so much as hint at his existence on Wednesday).

On the other hand, it’s a challenge that has reinvigorated the band as a live act, more than 50 years after it formed.

REVIEW Fleetwood Mac Live in Charlotte, NC February 25, 2019

At Fleetwood Mac show, Stevie Nicks confuses North and South Carolina. Or... something.
BY THÉODEN JANES | PHOTOS JEFF SINER
Charlotte Observer

Stevie Nicks was threatening to steal the evening, as can tend to happen when Stevie Nicks is in your band.

Not that there’s anything wrong with what the rest of Fleetwood Mac was doing on Sunday night at Spectrum Center in Charlotte.

It’s just that, well, Christie McVie — as remarkably velvety as her voice still sounds, relatively speaking, at 75 — isn’t much of a showwoman; and Mick Fleetwood — while he still seems to be having oodles of fun beating on the drums and shouting “WoooOOOOOOOooooo!,” at 71 — is perhaps too much of a showman, so that his manic persona almost feels like a schtick; and John McVie — I mean, he still can tickle the bass authoritatively, at 73 — but he now blends into the scenery as much as the band’s lesser-known seventh, eighth, and ninth men.

As for Lindsey Buckingham replacements Neil Finn and Mike Campbell, I’ll get to them in a minute.

But for now, like I was saying, it’s kind of hard to take your eyes off of Stevie Nicks. Or your ears.

Something about the way she drifts around the stage, twirling 360 degrees on her toes, shaking her tambourine to what seems like the beat of her own drum, waving her hands like a madwoman — it’s almost like everyone else is performing a show for middle-aged couples in button-down shirts and dressy blouses while Nicks is at Burning Man riding a pot-brownie high.

REVIEW Fleetwood Mac Live in Columbia, SC February 22, 2019

Without Buckingham, Fleetwood Mac Offered as Many Gems as Duds
Fleetwood Mac ripped the bandaid right off.

By Jordan Lawrence
Free-times

The bass drum started that familiar thump, keying one of classic rock’s most recognizable slow builds, forming into the bittersweet anthem “The Chain.” But on this night, it wasn’t guitarist Lindsey Buckingham yowling out the opening number’s searing rejoinder — “And if you don't love me now / You will never love me again / I can still hear you saying / You would never break the chain.”

Friday in Columbia, New Zealander Neil Finn, best known for his time fronting Crowded House, took lead vocal duties. He and former Tom Petty backer Mike Campbell joined Fleetwood Mac following Buckingham’s dismissal last year. Finn never quite mustered the frenzied indignation that gives the song its spark, making for an uneven start to an equally uneven concert, one that offered stirring highs and frustrating missteps in equal measure.

Regardless of whether they feel they were justified in firing Buckingham, Mac’s remaining core of Mick Fleetwood, John McVie, Stevie Nicks and Christine McVie broke the chain. And while their new hires brought impressive skills to the table, their insistence — displayed during “The Chain” — that they could sub Finn and Campbell in without losing anything marred some of the band’s best songs. It also made them seem like entitled jerks.