The tour Christine McVie said “nearly killed” Fleetwood Mac: “A lot of drugs”
In 1977, Fleetwood Mac had the world at their feet.
In February of that year, they had released Rumours, which would not only be one of the albums of the year, but of the entire decade. It would cement these newly formed members as the premier lineup for the band, whose greatness feasted upon the inner turmoil and drama within the group.
In fact, just one listen through Rumours would have told anyone that the foundations of this band were built on shaky ground. As compelling as the songwriting of intra-band betrayal and heartbreak was, it didn’t exactly scream career longevity. But in a warped sense of irony, the continued success of the band and their dramatic discography almost forced them to stay together.
As they noticed the appetite for their traumatic personal lives grew upon the success of their record, they soldiered on, through the obvious toxicity, to make their follow-up album, Tusk. Here, the fractious nature of the band’s dynamics came to the fore and impacted the music.
Lindsey Buckingham led the rest of the band down the path of his own vision, to create what was ultimately an inflated and misguided record, that lost all songwriting precision that came in the previous. The sonic contributions from each member felt relatively disjointed when compared to the previous record, and although it came so soon after their success, it somewhat marked the beginning of the end for the band.
That, combined with their excessive drug use, had also lost its creative potency. The endless consumption of cocaine weirdly worked to the band’s favour in Rumours, where they even had studio rituals in which to take it. The entire thing was chaotic and unhealthy, but for a brief period of time, it worked. Tusk proved what a record would sound like when all of that came undone.
As ever, though, the band pushed on through and went on a mammoth world tour for their fans. Facing the prospect of sharing a tour bus together, to then share a stage together, to sing songs about one another, they dove headfirst into debauchery as a coping mechanism, and it almost broke them.
“I remember we did two huge world tours after Tusk,” McVie said. “We drove ourselves into the ground physically, and obviously there was a lot of drinking and a lot of drugs, and that just about killed us all, so we took a lot of time off. There was a long time between Tusk and Mirage. Mick went to Ghana to make an album called The Visitor and Stevie [Nicks] made Bella Donna, which was a huge hit for her.”
It’s likely that on that tour, Nicks planted the seed of a solo idea in her brain. She had so much to give as an artist, and despite providing so much brilliance for the band, she still found herself subjected to the brutal trauma that being in it put her through. A hideous world tour, combined with a follow-up solo smash hit, would have ultimately proved to her that a future outside of the band existed for her.
