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Fleetwood Mac
"Listen to the wind blow, watch the sun rise..Run in the shadows, damn your love, damn your lies..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"...
Such a powerful verse..One that can be interpreted in many ways and yet is unmistakeable in meaning..Pain and love..This month, I am reviewing Fleetwood Mac and we will see and experience many diverse emotions and energies from their music..In each song, the lyrics and music and singing combines to make for a powerful spell that casts its magick on the listener in ways other groups will never understand, and could never hope to achieve..
While they have produced 30 years of music, both as a group and as individuals respectively, Fleetwood Mac is a force to be reckoned with..With such a vast amount of time spent making music together, there must surely be one hell of a bond of love, hate, pain, and happiness formed there..This is something that most of us will never be able to fathom..Bands such as this one, go beyond the realm of "norm" and become a solid, unified "one" with each other, that the pain of each is the pain of all, and the love of each is the love of all..And in their songs, these emotions are evident, and quality..
The album "Rumours" which came out in the late 70's was one that hit everyone with the full force of the combination of Stevie Nicks, Lindsay Buckingham, and Christine McVie, with John McVie and Mick Fleetwood bringing out the bass and drums..Sometimes I think maybe people like these have crossed over from another land and got lost here on their search back to wherever it is they came from..Their music strikes chords within the heart and soul, that hits several levels at once, and leaves the listener gasping for breath..Rumours was their attempt at expelling some serious pain within the band..
Starting at the beginning, the first song on the list is "Second hand news"..Within this song can be seen the turmoil that was between Stevie and Lindsay, and here he gives his account of things..
"I know there's nothing to say
Someone has taken my place
When times go bad
When times go rough
Won't you lay me down in tall grass
And let me do my stuff"..
Basically what he is saying is, he knows its over, she is seeing someone else, and when the going got bad, she got going..
"One thing I think you should know
I ain't gonna miss you when you go
Been down so long
I've been tossed around enough
Couldn't you just
Let me go down and do my stuff"..
And here he claims he won't miss her because she has kept him on a downer for so long, that he'll just be glad to have a bit of respite..He has been used and why couldn't she simply enjoy what there was instead of trying to make something else of it? So now he is old news - second hand news..Funny thing about love..It's one of those things that brings both great joy and tremendous pain with it..We try each other on for size like new clothes and when we have outgrown each other, we throw the old away and buy a new outfit..
Stevie picks it up in the next song "Dreams" which went number one in the charts as the majority of the songs on this album..
"Now here you go again
You say you want your freedom
Well who am I to keep you down
It's only right that you should
Play the way you feel it
But listen carefully to the sound
Of your loneliness
Like a heartbeat .. drives you mad
In the stillness of remembering what you had
And what you lost ...
And what you had ...
And what you lost
Thunder only happens when it's raining
Players only love you when they're playing
Say .. Women ... they will come and they will go
When the rain washes you clean .. you'll know"..
Not too difficult to interpret these lines..In the opening verse she is saying, ok, you want to be on your own, fine.. I won't stop you, but think hard about what you're walking out on..Remember what loneliness feels like, and what I was to you..And what I am no longer..You may have your pick of women who mean nothing, but when they are gone, and you open your eyes a little wider, you'll see the real truth..
All I can say is, it must have made one hell of a working environment with all the emotions flying around like crows of ill omen..The pain in the lyrics so far is more than sufficiently evident - and it's overwhelming..In "Never going back again" Lindsay makes it well known that he got the picture before, and won't be going down that road again in the future, just too painful..And Christine tries to offer the comfort of a new day in "Don't stop"..
"If you wake up and don't want to smile,
If it takes just a little while,
Open your eyes and look at the day,
You'll see things in a different way.
Don't stop, thinking about tomorrow,
Don't stop, it'll soon be here,
It'll be, better than before,
Yesterday's gone, yesterday's gone"...
It's like saying "Come on guys..It won't always be like this..Start tomorrow on a better note"..And then she goes on to say -
"Why not think about times to come,
And not about the things that you've done,
If your life was bad to you,
Just think what tomorrow will do"..
Hey think about what the future might have in store for you? Don't think about what's in the past - You can't change it or make it go away, so you may as well make the best of it, and get on with your lives..Still..It's a hard lesson to learn when you're hurting in the NOW..It's a bitter pill to swallow, especially when there's no water to help choke it down..
At least Christine tried..But no one was listening..They were not able to grasp it..Lindsay's pain becomes more apparent as we progress through the album, and we come to another heart - stopper "Go your own way"..
"Loving you
Isn't the right thing to do
How can I ever change things
That I feel?
If I could
Maybe I'd give you my world
How can I
When you won't take it from me?"..
Sometimes men and women just find they are at an impasse when it comes to communication..We are so same-ish, yet so completely different..Almost like we are from different planets sometimes..It's pretty crystal clear that these two loved each other genuinely, but they just lost the plot somewhere..Maybe it was all the drugs and booze, or being on the road alot that did it..Whatever it was, they lost the way to being able to speak to each other and instead, did it through the lyrics and the music..You can definitely glean this much from the lyrics, and the music has a soul of its own and conveys only too well, the heavy emotions that were going on during the course of when this album was made..
It was also during that time that Christine and John McVie were having troubles of their own..Everone was busy warring with one another, but some forgot to look in her general direction.. In this next one "Songbirds", she is speaking directly to her husband, and the songbirds she refers to are Stevie and Lindsay..
"For you, there'll be no more crying,
For you, the sun will be shining,
And I feel that when I'm with you,
It's alright, I know it's right
To you, I'll give the world
To you, I'll never be cold
'Cause I feel that when I'm with you,
It's alright, I know it's right.
And the songbirds are singing,
Like they know the score,
And I love you, I love you, I love you,
Like never before.
And I wish you all the love in the world,
But most of all, I wish it from myself.
And the songbirds keep singing,
Like they know the score,
And I love you, I love you, I love you,
Like never before, like never before"..
Here she says what's in her heart to say, and says that the "songbirds are singing like they know the score", or like they think they know what's really going on, but they are so wrapped up in their own worries, that they haven't got a real clue what's happening here..
This next song is one of my favorites..It's like a chant almost - rhythmic and undulating drums and bass, and solid voices building the energies and releasing them into the ether..Powerful stuff..In more ways than one..This is one of those songs where love and hate become one and the same..
"Listen to the wind blow
Watch the sun rise
Run in the shadows
Damn your love
Damn your lies
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"..
The chain is their bond with each other..To sever or break the chain, is to break that bond..I'm not gonna pick this one apart because I think it says all in these two verses..
Well at least Christine and John are getting somewhere in "You make loving fun"..Pretty simply put really..But then we go back to it again with Lindsay and Stevie in "I don't wanna know"..
"I don't want to know the reasons why
Love keeps right on walking down the line
I don't want to stand between you and love
Honey, I just want you to feel fine"..
Its like saying, I keep on looking for love, but it seems to always be one step ahead of me..Always the elusive prey..We all want it, we all look for it..We doll ourselves up, and go out looking, and hoping to find, but for some of us, it always stays one step ahead..
And then there are those times when we are in it, and things go on a downward spiral..It seems to be the end, and then suddenly, the one who loves us best pulls us out of the doldrums again, and we don't know how they could possibly love us still, because we have been a fool, and completely screwed things up..And sometimes, there is forgiveness for our great stupidity..And this is pretty obvious in the following verses -
"Oh Daddy,
You know you make me cry,
How can you love me,
I don't understand why.
Oh Daddy,
If I can make you see,
If there's been a fool around,
It's got to be me"..
And finally, we come to the end of the set with "Gold dust woman"..This song unlike the others, is one of pretty major drug abuse..Apparently, the coke was falling in blizzards during the time this album was made.. Probably accounts for alot of the turmoil..Coke leaves you thinking you're in control, and then one day, you wake up and see the control you thought you had, was only an illusion..
"Rock on -- gold dust woman
Take your silver spoon
And dig your grave
Heartless challenge
Pick your path and I'll pray
Wake up in the morning
See your sunrise -- loves -- to go down
Lousy lovers -- pick their prey
But they never cry out loud
Did she make you cry
Make you break down
Shatter your illusions of love
Is it over now -- do you know how
Pick up the pieces and go home"..
It must be said that Fleetwood Mac is one hell of a band..Musically, few bands can touch them, if any..But like most people, they too had their share of sorrows over the years..Pain touches us all in some deeply profound ways..It's one of those emotions that can and often is extremely debilitating when we fall victim to it..It's like a perpetual knife in between the shoulder blades that festers, and upon removal of that knife, causes that wound to become painful and bleed again..
For those who are interested in the band, their official website can be found here http://www.repriserec.com/fleetwoodmac/
This site is pretty great because it has it all in one go, including sound clips, so I won't bother with a link to amazon.com this month..This is where I got the great images from too..You will need Realplayer or Real one, found at http://www.real.com/ to listen to the audio clips, and Quicktime, found at http://www.apple.com/quicktime/to view the video clips..Well, this brings us to the end of another review, of yet another highly talented and thoroughly enjoyable band, one I have always loved since i was a child, and I think I just gave away my age by saying that! As always, I do hope you all have enjoyed the review..Until next month..
Dark Blessings~
Silver
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