WALL-TO-WALL HITS, PERFORMED BY A BAND
HYPER-CHARGED AND AT THE HEIGHT OF THEIR POWERS
IN SEPTEMBER 1982 Fleetwood Mac embarked on a 31-city U.S. tour in support of MIRAGE, an album that guitarist Lindsey Buckingham called a reconciliation of opposites." Those opposites were the world-conquering pop masterpiece RUMOURS and its experimental, less commercial follow-up, TUSK. It's a good description of MIRAGE. But really, Buckingham's colorful phrase would of made for an ideal tour slogan.
There were all kinds of yin and yang questions swirling around the bands future that fall, the most pressing of which was: Would Stevie Nicks stay or would she go?
Just like the white winged dove she sang about on her 1981 hit solo album, BELLA DONNA, Nicks had gotten a taste of freedom from what she called "the chaos and soap opera" of the group. And she liked it.
Adding a more personal layer to that drama, halfway through the tour, Stevie's best friend since childhood, Robin Anderson, died of leukemia.
So there's an undercurrent of raw, unresolved feelings — from grief to love to jealousy to existential angst-running through this live recording, culled from two sold-out nights at The Forum, in Inglewood, California.
As the band roars into the set with bare-wire versions of "Second Hand News" and "The Chain," you can immediately feel the bolts rattling and the lid trembling on the whole platinum machine, with bassist Join McVie and drummer Mick Fleetwood in the engine room, barely. keeping the big emotions in check.
What follows makes for a riveting listen — wall-to-wall hits, performed by a hand hyper-charged and at the height of their powers. "Don't Stop." "Rhiannon." "Gypsy," "Love In Store," "Go Your Own Way," "Dreams." The songs speak to the turmoil in the ranks, but they're also a reminder of how rock shows in decades past weren't merely faithful re-creations of studio album tracks. They were platforms to expand and reinvent songs for the stage, to let them breathe, to unleash different, wilder sides of a band. A reconciliation of opposites, if you will.
While Buckingham and Christine McVie deliver their songs with passion, hot and cool, respectively, it must be said that Stevie's voice, trembling with that dusky, incantatory vibrato, fills the speakers with the most profound pathos here. Her take on "Landslide" is definitive and for the ages with the line, "I built my life around you," distilling the whole web of emotional connections at play during the concert.
After an extended crescendo on "Sisters Of The Moon" lifts the show to its penultimate peak, it comes down to the hushed, prayer-like closer, McVie's "Songbird."
The late singer-keyboardist, always the calm eye of Fleetwood Mac's internal storm, had this to say in 1982, words that sum up the dynamic of this triple-LP set: "There is definitely a chemistry that transcends everything else that might happen before or after we're on stage. There have been many rough times, but we've always ended up on some high note, just getting a charge out of playing together."
- BILL DEMAIN
A CHEMISTRY THAT TRANSCENDS
EVERYTHING ELSE
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Live recordings from Fleetwood Mac’s two sold-out shows at The Forum in 1982 during the Mirage Tour will be featured in a new collection from Rhino on 3LP black vinyl, and 2CD
This 22-track live collection features six previously unreleased recordings from the 21 October 1982 show, including favourites like “Landslide,” “Don’t Stop,” and “Never Going Back Again.” The other songs were recorded at the 22 October show and have appeared on various releases through the years, including Live Super Deluxe Edition (2021), Mirage Super Deluxe Edition (2016) and the 1983 concert video Mirage Live.
In September 1982, Fleetwood Mac embarked on a 31-city U.S. tour in support of Mirage, the band’s fourth consecutive multi-platinum album and third No. 1 in America. Both shows at The Forum were recorded, and Mirage Tour ‘82 combines songs from both into a single concert experience.
Mick Fleetwood, John McVie, Christine McVie, Lindsey Buckingham, and Stevie Nicks were at the height of their collective power at these shows, delivering a hyper-charged setlist filled with hits new and old. Standouts include “Songbird,” “Oh Well,” “Love In Store,” “Go Your Own Way,” and a version of “Landside” for the ages.
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