1971 is often unfairly overlooked in the history of Fleetwood Mac. Many people love the guitar work of Peter Green, so when he left the band in mid-1970, interest plummeted. You can see that in a dearth of bootleg material for the years after he left. But even without Green, the band was still firing on all cylinders. They still had guitarist Danny Kirwan, who should have gone on to be a famous "guitar hero" in his own right, except for the fact that he flamed out of the band, and then later out of music altogether. The band also picked up the very talented Bob Welch as another lead guitarist and songwriter. The band's 1971 album "Future Games" is top notch in my book.
So I wanted to post a 1971 Fleetwood Mac concert. In terms of sound quality, it turns out there really is only one option: the Swing Auditorium show in San Bernardino, California, in July 1971. It's the only excellent soundboard bootleg from that year. The downside is that it's short and incomplete, only about 45 minutes when the band usually played at least twice that long.
To fix this, I've added five more songs of the same sound quality to the beginning of the album. They come from the official album "Madison Blues." It's a little known album that's kind of a grab-bag of material from the year or so after Green left the band. It has a bunch of songs that were performed at an unknown venue on an unknown date some time in January 1971. I left out a couple of songs that were duplicates of songs played at the Swing Auditorium. The result is that the 45-minute-long concert effectively sounds like an hour and 12-minute-long concert.
Both the Swing Auditorium and mystery Madison Blues recordings are excellent soundboards. But in a way they're too good, in the sense that they did a great job of capturing what was played on stage, but captured very little of the audience noise. That meant that after each song, it seemed like they played to an indifferent audience that barely cheered or clapped. To fix this, I tried to boost the volume of the audience reactions as much as possible. I also found some extended sections of generic cheering after a couple of the songs, and added that in to the ends of other songs, to further boost the audience response. The end result is now the songs still sound great but there also is the expected amount of cheering when each one of them ends.
01 Crazy about You (Fleetwood Mac)
02 talk (Fleetwood Mac)
03 One Together (Fleetwood Mac)
04 I Can't Stop Loving Her (Fleetwood Mac)
05 talk (Fleetwood Mac)
06 Lonely without You (Fleetwood Mac)
07 talk (Fleetwood Mac)
08 Jewel-Eyed Judy (Fleetwood Mac)
09 talk (Fleetwood Mac)
10 Station Man (Fleetwood Mac)
11 talk (Fleetwood Mac)
12 Get like You Used to Be (Fleetwood Mac)
13 Dragonfly (Fleetwood Mac)
14 Purple Dancer (Fleetwood Mac)
15 I'd Rather Go Blind (Fleetwood Mac)
16 talk (Fleetwood Mac)
17 Tell Me All the Things You Do (Fleetwood Mac)
18 Jam [Instrumental] (Fleetwood Mac)
https://www.upload.ee/files/15211919/FleetwodMc_1971b_SwngAuditriumSnBernardinoCA__7-19-1971_atse.zip.html
It surprisingly hard to find any photos of Fleetwood Mac playing in concert in 1971. I found one, which I think is from an appearance on the "Top of the Pops" TV show. It's not ideal in that it only shows three of the band members, and one of those (drummer Mick Fleetwood) is partially obscured. But it does show the two most important band members of that year, Christine McVie and Danny Kirwan.
Peter Green was with them at San Bernadino. When Jeremy Spencer left for the cult "Children Of God' , the band was stuck, they had a tour to do. They contacted Peter Green and he did this tour with them, but mostly stayed in the background, except when they played the Fillmore East and Peter decided to play. They did a 2 to 2 1/2 hour version of "Black Magic Woman", I know because I was there.
ReplyDeleteIn a Peter Green documentary their manager states they did a 4 hour version, NO, it was long but no longer than 2 1/2 hours. I wish someone would have taped it. I was in the 3rd row, what treat, one of my favorite memories.
That's interesting. But, in terms of this recording, it doesn't matter much if all Green did was play rhythm guitar. By contrast, hearing that Black Magic Woman would have been great. Lucky you!
DeleteI'm not a fan of the Fleetwood Mac of this period.
ReplyDeleteFor me, en clear decadence.
Sorry.
Racati, I refer you to Mandikoras on Youtube. To watch early Fleetwood Mac is a real treat.
ReplyDeleteThe line up on this one remains a mystery to me. I clearly hear Jeremy's slide guitar and voice, so he obviously hadn't left by this point. But then there's the heavy, chunky rhythm guitar in "Crazy About You' even during Danny Kirwan's solo... Who dat?
ReplyDeleteI don't know, but maybe someone else here does.
DeleteSee first comment here: "Peter Green was with them at San Bernadino."
DeleteI am the person who made the first comment. I saw them in March or April at the Fillmore East and Jeremy was DEFINITELY gone! Any guitar work in the background would be the one and only Peter Green R.I.P. Remember, he did play slide also. Listen to "Show Biz Blues" on "Then Play On". Now he is a LEGEND!!!
ReplyDeleteThanks for the info. But is there solid proof?
DeleteJeremy Spencer left the band at the beginning of this tour to join the cult; The Children Of God. The band was stuck, they had to do the tour or they would be sued. They contacted Peter Green and he agreed to do the JUST the tour as a favor. There is a Peter Green documentary on YouTube where they discuss this. Their manager even brings up the very concert I saw a the Fillmore East. He claims Peter played "Black Magic Woman" for 4 hours but, it was more like 2 hours. I WAS THERE. Since Jeremy left before March and never came back, he CANNOT be on a recording from July of that year. It would have to be Peter Green. Peter mostly stayed in the background during the tour except when they came to the Fillmore. Check out the YouTube documentary and you will see what I am talking about.
ReplyDelete