Green Or Kirwan Or Welch Or Buckingham-Nicks?

I recently bought used copies of two of Danny Kirwan's solo albums. They were a couple bucks a piece so I figured, what the heck? The better one is the first one, called "Second Chapter". It's kind of a laid back country/rock sounding album. The guitar is not featured much at all. The other one called Hey Big Boy, is very MOR sounding with the guitar solos done by Bob Weston (former Fleetwood Mac) and some other guy. I doubt I will listen to either one of them again.
 
The "limited doses" thing is the key. We've been so saturated with B-N era Mac for the last forty years that we've become desensitized and deaf to the fact that it was actually well-written and carefully crafted pop music
Ughh, why'd you go and say pop music and spoil it? At 13 I left the AM dial, top 40, pop music, et al for AOR fm forever. It was a real differentiator for those of us that considered ourselves to be about serious music. Even at 60 I must be in denial that I do listen to some old pop. I still bristle at the word and prefer to call it commersh.
 
I like Bare Trees because it seems the most thematically integrated album. From Then Play On is similar in that manner. The other Green stuff just doesn't really do it for me and although I love the big hits off of FM and Rumours those albums seem a bit disparate in styles. Maybe because of the different styles of the main singers. I do like Tusk however since it seems to more of a group effort. I just bought the three disk deluxe version.
 
All those ragging on the Lindsey Buckingham era. This would fit perfectly in any prior incarnations of the band. Classic Fleetwood Mac sound.

 
Bob Welch gets little credit for carrying Fleetwood Mac but he did. After Green and Kirwan left he stepped in and put out some great music often overlooked by so called Fleetwood Mac fans. Mystery to Me and Bare Trees are both great albums.

But after that I have to say I'm just a Fleetwood Mac fan. Green/Kirwan/Welch/Buckingham have all had a hand in it. I think Christine McVie gets to little credit sometimes since she wrote some of their biggest hits. But still all in all I'm a fan of it all.

eta: and what does this say about the core of FM.....John McVie and Mick Fleetwood. 2 guys that not just held a band together through it all but the band thrived. Each incarnation was different than the last but each one was great.
 
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They started out as part of the British Blues Boom, went to the states as a (belated) part of the British Invasion, fell apart and came back an American pop band, finally becoming a place for Christine Perfect's vocal talents to go to waste. So, yeah, Green for me.
 
Welch and his solo albums too.
I really thought the albums he did with his 3 piece band, Paris, was good rockin stuff.

I thought the Buckingham, Nix version was my least favorite version of FM. However, when I saw them live they were incredible. Buckingham just ran the show and he was outstanding.
 
Bob Weston, who played lead guitar on "Mystery To Me" and "Penguin", was another great player. Unfortunately, he was playing around with Mick Fleetwood's wife as well, and was fired.
Who didn't play around with Mick Fleetwood's wife?
 
I'm not as familiar with pre B/N Mac as most of you. But I will say that I'm pretty amazed with Buckinghams studio prowess. Pop songs or not, that man knew his way around production.

It makes me a little sad sometimes that there are, and have been, some really great musicians out there who could release amazing music... if they'd just get their goddamn heads out of the booth and leave it to the professionals. In the same vein, musicians that need to back a bit away from the concept of a "live" sound. Live shows are fun because of the event. Live recorded music is generally terrible. And I know it makes them want to recreate the rush they get from performing, but that's really only about 25% of making an album. The other 75% is writing and arrangement, production and mixing, and assloads of money, and possibly drugs.
 
Future Games is the album I'll pull out on a grey rainy day and play it at a good clip -
Its my go to album for Fleetwood Mac ...

Next up is probably Bare trees, followed by Oh Well ...
I overplayed Mystery to Me at one point - it'll go on the platter 3rd or 4th ...
(If its been a funky week, I may get into Live in Chicago or some of the old bluesey stuff,
but I don't find myself in that bluesey place very often any more ...)

Otherwise, maybe a track here or there from Kiln House
- followed by some skipping around for a song here and there from
Tango in the Night, Tusk, and Rumors or some of Stevie's solo stuff ...

Can you tell I really enjoy Classic Mac?
 
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