(Credits: Far Out / Fleetwood Mac)
Thu 2 October 2025 20:01, UK
There was a certain persistence that guided Mick Fleetwood through every year of Fleetwood Mac.
Although everything about the band seemed to be rocky when they first started making a name for themselves, their ability to rise from any setback was half the reason why they were able to keep their momentum when losing bandmates. And even though the classic lineup may be a thing of the past, Fleetwood did acknowledge that their wilderness periods were far from perfect from back to front.
But when looking at their track record, Fleetwood was either the luckiest or unluckiest musician in the world depending on how you look at it. There was already the problem of dealing with the musical soap opera that unfolded during the era of Rumours, but when listening to the Peter Green-fronted version of the group, it’s heartbreaking to hear how good they sound on They Play On knowing that Green would end up struggle with mental health and slowly distance himself from the rest of the group.
Despite every version of the band having their fair share of highlights, though, the true testament to how they worked usually came from those transitional periods. Bob Welch was a phenomenal presence in the band during his time with them, and even if records like Rumours get the credit for being bold leaps into commercial material, it’s a crime that albums like Bare Trees don’t get the same treatment.
Then again, some of the in-between records were never going to hold a candle to what they could truly do. Everyone already had to deal with their manager trying to replace them with an all-new version of the group in the 1970s, but when they lost Nicks and Buckingham in the 1990s, it’s hard to listen to a version of the group with Bekka Bramlett and Billy Burnette and think it’s anywhere near the same band.
But when they weren’t dealing with bad band chemistry, they had to worry about their members holding on for very long. Jeremy Spencer would eventually join a cult and leave the band of his own accord, but when looking at Danny Kirwan’s time with the group, Fleetwood felt that the guitarist was going through way too many internal problems to commit to the touring lifestyle.
Even though Kirwan was a great force in the group and made fantastic tunes during his time with the band, Fleetwood said that it was a mistake to let him into the group in the first place, saying, “We didn’t realise Danny wasn’t suited to this business. That wasn’t obvious in the late ’60s when he recorded with us, but he became very unpredictable. We should have said no to him joining, because he was already an alcoholic. I don’t know if that’s ever been fixed.”
And it’s not like most of them didn’t see the problems from the start, either. While Welch said that he was a fan of Kirwan’s and loved working with him on their records, there was always a moody energy around him that made him feel a bit more detached from the rest of the band whenever he played.
Although this version of the band was a lot different from what Fleetwood had in his head for what Fleetwood Mac became, it wasn’t like he would trade his time with Kirwan for someone else, either. It might not have been the right time to bring him on by any stretch, but if they hadn’t learned the lessons of working with someone like Kirwan, perhaps they would have never had the persistence to work with Lindsey Buckingham later.
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