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FLEETWOOD MAC - BRISBANE, AUSTRALIA
ENTERTAINMENT CENTRE
DECEMBER 16, 2009
Photos by: Gerry Rocks
Well done!!
Thursday, December 17, 2009
STEVIE NICKS TARANAKI DAILY NEWS PHOTO
Great shot of Stevie Nicks on pg.3 of the Taranaki Daily News December 17th. Looks to be a shot from 2006 - possibly from the last time she was in New Zealand touring solo.
Wednesday, December 16, 2009
PHOTOS: Fleetwood Mac Live in London October 31, 2009 at Wembley Arena
FLEETWOOD MAC - LONDON
WEMBLEY ARENA 10/31/09 (Night 2)
Photos By: ms muffet
Gallery (View Gallery)
Wonderful shots!
REVIEW ROCK LEGENDS FLEETWOOD MAC SWEPT INTO PERTH
FLEETWOOD MAC @ Members Equity Stadium, Perth (12/12/09)
Review by: OneGiantLeap
Review by: OneGiantLeap
It’s not often you see an arena jam-packed with both Baby Boomers and Gen Y kids pumping their fists in the air in adoration of a shared rock idol – but that’s exactly what happened last weekend when seventies rock legends Fleetwood Mac swept into Perth on their Unleashed tour and dazzled legions of fans at Members Equity Stadium.
A curious melange of punters poured into the stadium as the sun began to set: middle-aged hippies, parents and their kids, raucous bogans and hip twenty-somethings.
Once night fell, the speakers crackled to life with a crescendoing electric fuzz – it sounded like a locust plague was about to descend on the stadium – before the stage exploded with light and a chugging guitar riff launched proceedings with the band’s 1975 hit, Monday Morning.
The crowd was in almost silent awe as their idols appeared before them in the flesh. Guitarist Lindsay Buckingham bounced around in a black leather jacket while singer Stevie Nicks graced the stage whirling around in a black chiffon gown and hammering her tambourine with her black leather gloves. Drummer and namesake Mick Fleetwood resembled an old sea captain, complete with glorious white beard and red kerchief – all he lacked was a wooden pipe – while bassist John McVie kept a low profile even during a sleek, early bass solo.
The band ripped through electrifying performances of Monday Morning and The Chain, apparently impervious to the audience’s incessant screams of, “I love you, Stevie!”
After the second song of the night, Nicks welcomed the audience with an enthusiastic cry of “Welcome, Perth, Australia!” delighting the crowd.
“It’s taken a long time to get back here,” Nicks confessed in her disarming American drawl, “so let’s just get this party started!” she bellowed, before charging into one of the band’s most recognisable hits, Dreams.
Buckingham took the mic after Dreams, and the crowd fell silent to hear his address.
“Every time we get together, we say, – œLet’s just go out there and have fun!’ ... and that’s something we’ve always done. We’re just gonna do all the songs we really love and hopefully they’re the ones you love, too.”
It certainly set the mood for the first half of the concert. Promoted as a Greatest Hits tour (the band hasn’t released a studio album since 2003’s Say You Will), the band relished the opportunity to revisit their classic hits, introducing most songs with a monologue or anecdote about how the song came into being, which gave the entire performance an intimate feel: the band members were speaking directly – and candidly – to their fans.
Nicks introduced Gypsy by reminiscing about the glorious era of West Coast music in the late 1960s and early 1970s, and recounting the tale of how she and Buckingham first met and then came to join Fleetwood Mac. The namedropping came thick and fast as she recalled the band opening for late legends Janis Joplin and Jimi Hendrix, much to fans’ delight.
The reflective mood persisted as the band tore through amped-up versions of Go Insane and Rhiannon. Buckingham was brutally honest as he touched on the past turmoil of the band, which has seen more volatile clashes and line-up changes than perhaps any rock band in history.
The most recent of these changes – the departure of singer and keyboardist Christine McVie – was particularly noticeable on tracks like Don’t Stop and Say You Love Me, where Nicks and Buckingham were forced to cover for her absence. The songs still got the audience to their feet, but there was definitely the sense that someone was missing.
Toward the latter half of the two and a half hour set, something changed. The pensive, chilled-out vibe that the band had evoked began to bubble and boil into something hotter.
It started with Tusk, the experimental marching-band tune that had the audience bouncing and screaming like maniacs for the first time all night as Buckingham pogoed around on stage like a man half – or even a third – his age; he turned sixty this year.
The Mac began to rock out after that. An acoustic version of Big Love proved that Buckingham has fingers of steel and a gravelly throat that even Dave Grohl would envy, while a metallic rendition of early tune Oh Well had fists pumping across the stadium, the band’s unique brand of folk-metal sounding clear and razor-sharp in the oft-maligned acoustics of Members Equity Stadium.
The biggest hit of the night was one from left field. Buckingham finished I’m So Afraid with a wailing guitar solo that just didn’t stop. Faces in the front rows melted as he stabbed desperately at the strings of his guitar with hands that, toward the end, were clearly burning – but the licks kept coming and the crowd kept roaring. It felt like there was a lot more at stake than there really was, and that is exactly why the entire show became so entrancing. Fleetwood Mac didn’t perform like a washed-up band rehashing their greatest hits for a quick buck: they performed as though every song, every harmony, every note was downright crucial – both artistically and personally. Nicks constantly stretched her throaty voice as high as she possibly could; Fleetwood hammered one breakdown after another on the drums; and Buckingham’s fingers were defiantly relentless. To see a band of sexagenarians at this point in their career trying this hard when they don’t even need to is something truly spectacular: the audience knew, definitively, that they were in the presence of legends.
When Buckingham’s guitar solo finished after more than five minutes, he was welcomed by a standing ovation – as was the band when they finished their set with an extended version of signature tune Go Your Own Way.
“We’ll see you next time!” Nicks promised, after the encore of Don’t Stop.
It was an enigmatic note for the 61-year-old to close on. Will Fleetwood Mac still be around for another tour in a few years’ time? Only time will tell, of course, but judging from the audience’s reaction, there’d be no complaints if these guys didn’t stop.
Fleetwood Mac Perth Setlist:
The band ripped through electrifying performances of Monday Morning and The Chain, apparently impervious to the audience’s incessant screams of, “I love you, Stevie!”
After the second song of the night, Nicks welcomed the audience with an enthusiastic cry of “Welcome, Perth, Australia!” delighting the crowd.
“It’s taken a long time to get back here,” Nicks confessed in her disarming American drawl, “so let’s just get this party started!” she bellowed, before charging into one of the band’s most recognisable hits, Dreams.
Buckingham took the mic after Dreams, and the crowd fell silent to hear his address.
“Every time we get together, we say, – œLet’s just go out there and have fun!’ ... and that’s something we’ve always done. We’re just gonna do all the songs we really love and hopefully they’re the ones you love, too.”
It certainly set the mood for the first half of the concert. Promoted as a Greatest Hits tour (the band hasn’t released a studio album since 2003’s Say You Will), the band relished the opportunity to revisit their classic hits, introducing most songs with a monologue or anecdote about how the song came into being, which gave the entire performance an intimate feel: the band members were speaking directly – and candidly – to their fans.
Nicks introduced Gypsy by reminiscing about the glorious era of West Coast music in the late 1960s and early 1970s, and recounting the tale of how she and Buckingham first met and then came to join Fleetwood Mac. The namedropping came thick and fast as she recalled the band opening for late legends Janis Joplin and Jimi Hendrix, much to fans’ delight.
The reflective mood persisted as the band tore through amped-up versions of Go Insane and Rhiannon. Buckingham was brutally honest as he touched on the past turmoil of the band, which has seen more volatile clashes and line-up changes than perhaps any rock band in history.
The most recent of these changes – the departure of singer and keyboardist Christine McVie – was particularly noticeable on tracks like Don’t Stop and Say You Love Me, where Nicks and Buckingham were forced to cover for her absence. The songs still got the audience to their feet, but there was definitely the sense that someone was missing.
Toward the latter half of the two and a half hour set, something changed. The pensive, chilled-out vibe that the band had evoked began to bubble and boil into something hotter.
It started with Tusk, the experimental marching-band tune that had the audience bouncing and screaming like maniacs for the first time all night as Buckingham pogoed around on stage like a man half – or even a third – his age; he turned sixty this year.
The Mac began to rock out after that. An acoustic version of Big Love proved that Buckingham has fingers of steel and a gravelly throat that even Dave Grohl would envy, while a metallic rendition of early tune Oh Well had fists pumping across the stadium, the band’s unique brand of folk-metal sounding clear and razor-sharp in the oft-maligned acoustics of Members Equity Stadium.
The biggest hit of the night was one from left field. Buckingham finished I’m So Afraid with a wailing guitar solo that just didn’t stop. Faces in the front rows melted as he stabbed desperately at the strings of his guitar with hands that, toward the end, were clearly burning – but the licks kept coming and the crowd kept roaring. It felt like there was a lot more at stake than there really was, and that is exactly why the entire show became so entrancing. Fleetwood Mac didn’t perform like a washed-up band rehashing their greatest hits for a quick buck: they performed as though every song, every harmony, every note was downright crucial – both artistically and personally. Nicks constantly stretched her throaty voice as high as she possibly could; Fleetwood hammered one breakdown after another on the drums; and Buckingham’s fingers were defiantly relentless. To see a band of sexagenarians at this point in their career trying this hard when they don’t even need to is something truly spectacular: the audience knew, definitively, that they were in the presence of legends.
When Buckingham’s guitar solo finished after more than five minutes, he was welcomed by a standing ovation – as was the band when they finished their set with an extended version of signature tune Go Your Own Way.
“We’ll see you next time!” Nicks promised, after the encore of Don’t Stop.
It was an enigmatic note for the 61-year-old to close on. Will Fleetwood Mac still be around for another tour in a few years’ time? Only time will tell, of course, but judging from the audience’s reaction, there’d be no complaints if these guys didn’t stop.
Fleetwood Mac Perth Setlist:
- Monday Morning
- The Chain
- Dreams
- I Know I’m Not Wrong
- Gypsy
- Go Insane
- Rhiannon
- Second-Hand News
- Tusk
- Sara
- Big Love (acoustic)
- Landslide (dedicated to Nicks’ goddaughters, Ruby and Tessa)
- Never Going Back Again
- Storms
- Say You Love Me
- Gold Dust Woman
- Oh Well
- I’m So Afraid
- Stand Back
- Go Your Own Way
- World Turning
- Don’t Stop
- Silver Springs
NEW PLYMOUTH POLICE NOT EXPECTING TROUBLE THIS WEEKEND
Taranaki Daily News
By MATT RILKOFF
By MATT RILKOFF
New Plymouth's two Fleetwood Mac concerts this weekend will give police and the city a pair of Saturday nights.
But the boys in blue are not expecting any trouble from the 36,000 Fleetwood Mac fans in town for the Saturday and Sunday night concerts.
Senior Sergeant Robbie O'Keefe said police would be treating the Sunday night the same as a Saturday in terms of staff numbers to cope with the influx on fans.
As well as that 10 inner-city bars have applied for special licences to stay open until 2am on Monday morning, so Sunday's concertgoers can keep the good times rolling.
Usually the quietest night of the week, this Sunday will almost certainly see some of the 18,000 fans heading to town around 10pm. "Honestly, we aren't expecting any trouble from them," Mr O'Keefe said. "We'll be there to make sure everyone is having a good time and the CBD remains vibrant and safe for them to do that."
That vibrancy will be visible on the streets longer than usual with most bars extending their outdoor areas for the two nights and keeping them open longer.
Usually such outdoor spots have to move inside by 1am but on Sunday morning they will be allowed until 3am and Monday 2am.
Venture Taranaki's regional tourism man, Paul Stancliffe, said while many people would start arriving in the city today and tomorrow, most of the 20,000 non-Taranaki people expected would be travelling here on Saturday. "With both concerts sold out we can expect town to be saturated with people, hopefully not with rain," he said.
At this stage Saturday's weather is looking to be cloudy and with a small chance of rain. Sunday fares a little better with mostly clear skies.
The decades old supergroup finished the Australian leg of their Unleashed tour last night in Brisbane, with New Plymouth their next gigs.
Reviews of their concerts have been overwhelmingly enthusiastic.
Kathy McCabe, music editor of Sydney's The Daily Telegraph said of the concert "Hit after hit after hit, the setlist would represent the Holy Grail to any band who has only a couple of records under their belt."
The city's two sold-out shows are the group's last in their 10-month global tour but it seems unlikely they will stop playing together.
Rumours are already swirling about a possible US tour with The Eagles next year.
INSIDERS SUGGEST STADIUMS OF UP TO 70,000 FOR FLEETWOOD MAC/EAGLES
Fleetwood Mac & The Eagles Eyeing Joint Summer Stadium Tour
By: Howie Edelson
Promoters are pitching a joint Fleetwood Mac/Eagles Sumner tour of stadium and arenas to venue operators and promoters across the U.S., according to livedaily.com. The site reports that "the double bill is being considered for a combination of single nights in baseball and football stadiums and multiple nights in arenas." No dates have been announced, but industry insiders are suggesting that the show will undoubtedly pack stadiums of up to 70,000 at every venue the tour plays. So far there's been no word as to when an announcement will be made.
Throughout their '70s heyday, the groups'kept up a friendly rivalry while vying for the top spot as California's hottest rock band. Fleetwood Mac and the Eagles have only played on the same bill twice -- on July 25th, 1976, in Foxboro, Massachusetts at Schaefer Stadium; and on January 12th, 1998 when both bands performed at New York;'s Waldorf Astoria for their respective inductions into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
Don Henley and Stevie Nicks were romantically linked back in the late '70s, and scored a 1981 Top Ten hit with their duet "Leather And Lace." The pair went on to tour with each other in 2005. Henley shed some light on his deep friendship with Nicks: "We go back a long way. We don't see very much of each other these days. I mean, she's got her life and I've got mine, and there's certainly nothing going on here on a romantic level. But we're friends. We feel like we've been through a lot of the same things in our careers."
Nicks was asked how, after so many years as a working unit, Fleetwood Mac is able to still deliver at the top of their game with each new road trek: "It stays fresh because we never stop playing. Y'know, basically what we are is entertainers. Even if this band had never made it big, we'd be playing all the clubs, we'd be playing all the clubs in Europe, we'd be still doing that because what we really are is entertainers. So when we go onstage -- we're performers. We're performance artists, that's what we do. So it isn't a question of keeping it fresh because it's what we love. We don't basically have anything else to do."
Fleetwood Mac performed last night (December 16th) in Boondall, Australia.
The Eagles will play their first-ever shows at L.A.'s Hollywood Bowl on March 16th, 17th, and 20th.
REVIEW: Fleetwood Mac Live in Brisbane "Fleetwood’s wearing well"
Brisbane Entertainment Centre Review:
By: Noel Mengel
The Courier Mail
FLEETWOOD Mac have survived bustups, missing band members, messy affairs and complete musical makeovers in their 40-year career.
They aren’t letting a little thing like a year spent on the road slow them down either.
The band played the first of two Brisbane Entertainment Centre shows last night, playing for 2½ hours and packing the set with songs from their Fleetwood Mac, Rumours and Tusk albums.
It’s an odd mix but the contrasts are what made them strong: the two veterans of the British blues boom, with Stevie Nicks’s ethereal spirit contrasting with Lindsey Buckingham’s intensity.
Sadly keyboard player Christine McVie has retired and her songs are missed, while Mick Fleetwood is returning in February with his blues band to play tunes from the band’s pre-1975 history, mostly absent here.
The format isn’t much altered from their set at the same venue five years ago, with room for solo excursions, plus loads of Buckingham’s guitar solos.
Somethings you expect: Stevie in black, Lindsey lean in leather jacket, John McVie in his cap.
Some things are a surprise: the aggression that Buckingham brings to songs like The Chain, Nick’s exquisite delivery of Landslide. Plus, they can always kick the show into high gear anytime they want to drop the big bombs, songs like, Rhiannon, Sara, and Go Your Own Way.
As Buckingham explained, there were a lot of emotional opposites in songs like Second Hand News.
The old hurts that produced songs like that might be way in the past, but the songs themselves have weathered well.
Fleetwood Mac play the Brisbane Entertainment Centre again tonight.
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