YMMV / Fleetwood Mac

• Americans Hate Tingle/Germans Love David Hasselhoff: Weirdly went both ways on this in the pre-Buckingham/Nicks era. They hit it big in Britain with their first few albums, but barely registered in America. "Albatross" was a #1 hit in Britain, but only made the Bubbling Under the Hot 100 chart in Billboard. Then after Peter Green left their popularity began waning in their home country, but they suddenly started getting an audience in America. Thanks to constant touring and airplay on FM radio, their American sales gradually improved in the Bob Welch era (they were such a reliable favorite on the U.S. college circuit by 1974 that the in-house joke at Warner Brothers went that the revenues from the Mac paid WB's electric bills), with Heroes are Hard to Find cracking the Billboard Top 40. Which is why Mick Fleetwood knew he had to come up with a really good plan to replace Welch. Luckily, he did.
• Audience-Alienating Era: The period after Tango in the Night up until The Dance. The band lost 2 of its 3 songwriters (Lindsey left in 1987, followed by Stevie in 1991) and their two albums from this period, Behind the Mask and Time, were poorly received by critics and the public, with the latter not even charting on the Billboard 200 when just 2 albums before Tango in the Night had gone multi-platinum and scored multiple Top 20 Hits. Luckily the classic lineup's reunion in 1997 did a lot to restore interest in the band.
• Audience-Alienating Premise: Tusk confused a lot of people who wanted another slick pop-rock outing in the vein of Rumours, even if it was Vindicated by History as a classic of experimental pop. The fact that it was a double album made it even worse.
• Awesome Music:
  • Rumours. Created by five people who had no sane reason to be in the same room with each other, writing lyrics about the break-ups and emotional trauma within the band itself. They crafted one of the best-selling and popular albums - filled with some of the bitterest out-of-love and beautiful falling-in-love songs - of all time.
  • Their second best-selling album Tango In The Night takes Fleetwood Mac's characteristic mellow pop-rock sound and mixes it with the high-tech 80's production (drum machines and synthesizers) perfectly. Highlights include the catchy as hell Christine McVie-penned songs "Little Lies", "Everywhere", and "Isn't It Midnight", the gorgeous "Seven Wonders" written by Stevie Nicks, and Lindsey Buckingham's mysterious, yet absolutely badass "Big Love".
    • "Big Love" in particular had a 12-inch remix that turned a rather mellow rock song into a proto-house dance track. Sounds very uncharacteristic for Fleetwood Mac, but it was a huge hit on the Billboard dance charts and it remains one of the best 12-inch remixes to come out from the 80's.
  • Many to choose from but "Rhiannon" and "Go Your Own Way" stand out. The live versions of both "Rhiannon" and "I'm So Afraid" also count.
  • "The Chain" as well.
  • The Dance is pretty damn awesome for being the reunion of the band's classic lineup. The last two songs on the album, "Tusk" and "Don't Stop" are accompanied by the USC Marching Band (who performed on the original studio version of "Tusk") and they are just glorious. The live version of "Silver Springs" is frequently touted as being the best version of the song ever recorded.
  • Tusk.
  • The version of Nicks' solo hit "Stand Back" from Live In Boston, Epic Instrumental Opener and all.
  • Any recent version of the Live at the Boston Tea Party album.
• Bizarro Episode: Tusk was influenced by Punk Rock and New Wave Music, especially on Lindsey Buckingham's songs, to a degree never before or since.
• Broken Base:
  • Between the fans of the Peter Green/Jeremy Spencer-era blues band and those of the Lindsey Buckingham/Stevie Nicks-era pop band.
  • Also between fans of the Buckingham line-up and the fans of the current line-up.
• Covered Up:
  • "Black Magic Woman" (Santana's cover is better-known than the Mac's original.)
  • "The Green Manalishi (With the Two-Pronged Crown)" is more associated with Judas Priest.
  • "Rhiannon" and "Landslide" have also been covered by various artists, but not as famously.
  • Santana's "Black Magic Woman" has almost certainly Covered Up the original in the US; the Mac version was more popular in the UK though, so it is more arguable there.
  • A lot the younger generation (those born in the 90's) seem to think "Landslide" is a Dixie Chicks song. And "Dreams" is a Corrs song.
  • Bob Welch's 1977 solo hit version of "Sentimental Lady" Covered Up the original Mac version from Bare Trees (though Welch removed a verse from the original). Since Fleetwood, Buckingham and Christine McVie all appeared on the 1977 version, it was still largely a Fleetwood Mac song anyway.
• Ending Fatigue: The second part of "Oh Well". Though that's its own piece, and Peter Green considers it the only important part of "Oh Well", even originally wanting it to be the first part.
• Heartwarming Moments: Amidst all the drama in the band, Stevie Nicks and Christine McVie have been friends since Stevie and Lindsey joined. Mick Fleetwood wanted to be sure Stevie and Christine would get along, so he arranged for Stevie and Lindsey to meet the band at a Mexican restaurant for dinner. Christine and Stevie hit it off from day one.
  • Near the end of the legendary 1982 Mirage Tour concert which started with Stevie and Lindsey basically having a fight on stage during "The Chain", Stevie breaks down in tears after singing "Sisters of the Moon". Lindsey, while continuing to play, comforts her for a moment putting his head on her shoulder. Followed immediately by a sweet interaction between Christine and John. Watch the whole concert here.
• Germans Love David Hasselhoff: "Hypnotized", despite never being released as a single, became a favorite on U.S. FM radio and remained a concert staple into Lindsey Buckingham's early tenure.
• Hilarious in Hindsight: If you listen closely in the beginning of the song "Tusk", just before the beat kicks in, you can hear someone asking, "How are those tenders, Johnny?" When JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Steel Ball Run introduced a Stand named after Tusk, take a wild guess what the user's first name was.
• Memetic Mutation:
  • "Little Lies" is this with gamers, calling it the "theme song" for Bethesda director Todd Howard as he is infamous for over-hyping his games with overstatements and trying to justify them by saying that "It just works."
  • In October 2020, a TikTok video went viral of a man on a skateboard drinking Ocean Spray cranberry juice and lip-synching to the song "Dreams". It inspired many parodies and even Mick Fleetwood and Stevie Nicks got in on the trend. It also helped resurge the song and band back into the spotlight of Generation Z.
• Misaimed Fandom: "Dreams" quickly became an anthem of "good vibes" in October 2020 due to its easy listening sound however, the lyrics are actually a very sad song about a bitter breakup and separation. (And a real breakup between the actual band members no less!)
• Misattributed Song: The Christine McVie-sung cover of Etta James's "I'd Rather Go Blind" that appeared on The Best of Peter Green's Fleetwood Mac compilation is not by Fleetwood Mac, but by Chicken Shack, Christine's band before she joined Fleetwood Mac. And it's not a Christine solo track either, as the same track also appeared on Christine's first solo album which she released under her maiden name.
• More Popular Spin Off: Of John Mayall & the Bluesbreakers, which Peter Green, Mick Fleetwood and McVie had previously played in.
• Narm: Mick Fleetwood's vest solo, as seen during the Tango in the Night tour.
• Posthumous Popularity Potential: Bob Welch got some overdue appreciation for his Fleetwood Mac work after his suicide in 2012.
• Protection from Editors: Tusk. Fans, critics and the band themselves consider it one of their best, however, which shows that Tropes Are Not Bad.
• Refrain from Assuming: "Isn't It Midnight" is not "The Face Of A Pretty Girl." The title is said in the refrain but doesn't stand out as much.
• Sacred Cow: Rumours is seen as not only their best album, but one of the greatest albums of all time. In addition, it's commercially one of the best-selling albums of all time, and even netted the band a Grammy Award for Album Of The Year. Even those who don't like or aren't fans of Fleetwood Mac recognize it as a pretty unimpeachable selection of songs.
• Sequel Displacement:
  • OK, which incarnation do you remember best: Peter Green, the ones with the lineup chaos, or Nicks + Buckingham?
  • The Buckingham/Nicks lineup has an odd habit of putting out things with the same title as existing Fleetwood Mac releases:
    • 2 albums titled Fleetwood Mac
    • 2 albums titled Live in Boston
    • 2 songs titled Only You
    • 2 songs titled Angel
    • The 1968 album Fleetwood Mac has a song called "The World Keep On Turning", and later, a song called "World Turning" was released on the 1975 album Fleetwood Mac (The latter was definitely inspired by first somewhat, in this case)
• Signature Song:
  • Quite a few, including "Don't Stop", "Landslide", "Go Your Own Way", "Dreams", "Rhiannon", "Silver Springs", "Gypsy", "Everywhere", and "Little Lies", to name some of them.
  • Another song that qualifies is "The Chain", although never released as a single. It remains one of their most popular songs on streaming and one of the main songs the band is associated with.
  • The song "Tusk" is shared with the USC Trojans marching band, who memorably appeared in the music video and the 1997 reunion concert. Other universities are known to play the song, but the Trojans are vociferous about it being theirs.
  • Especially "Dreams" made a resurgence in October 2020 after a TikTok video of the song went viral and absolutely spiked the numbers on streaming services rapidly.
  • Overall, the ones that tie for gold are "Dreams", "Go Your Own Way" and "The Chain".
  • "Oh Well" from the Peter Green era, so much so that it remained a concert staple long after Green left the band.
• Song Association:
  • "Seven Wonders" is suddenly popular with samplers - Pictureplanes' "Goth Star" and Classix' "Hanging Gardens" feature the main riff prominently - and Nicks' "American Horror Story" appearance made a minor meme of the title.
  • Some people may have only ever heard of the song "Only Over You" due to it being sampled in Eccojams, on track A2.
• Suspiciously Similar Song: John Lennon was quite taken with "Albatross" and borrowed its chord progressions for "Don't Let Me Down" and "Sun King".
• Tear Jerker: "Landslide". "Songbird". "Little Lies".

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