j.w.

The only real difference between now & '97 is that Christine is no longer touring, so I assume they're making up for that portion of the catalog with cuts from Stevie & Lindsay's solo efforts. The band has toured semi-regularly since '97, so they're not rusty or anything. Also, Lindsay's solo tours have been top notch. And Stevie just performed at the Sundance Film Festival with Dave Grohl's band to promote his new film, Sound City (which is superb). They've all still got it, as much as they did in '97, I suspect.

I think everyone in the band would disagree with you there. Even if he didn't write all of the songs, it was his arrangements that tied them all together, & you can see the band increasingly relying on him, to the point that Tusk is practically his singular vision. Christine had a stronger presence than Stevie, certainly, but if you check out the new release of Rumours, there's early versions of Stevie's The Chain (which sounded completely different than the final version, except for the chorus) & Christine's Keep Me There, of which the second half was appropriated to create the final The Chain, & I get the impression that Lindsay was orchestrating that sort of stuff. Stevie even comes out & says on the Classic Albums Rumours doc that Lindsay had a way of arranging her songs to be the best that they could be "when he wanted to."

I really feel like both incarnations of the band were in the upper echelons of what they did, which was two completely different things. But in terms of Peter Green's playing, I actually listen to John Mayall's A Hard Road more, which was the precursor to Fleetwood Mac. Peter & John McVie were both Bluesbreakers at the time, & Aynsley Dunbar did most of the drumming but Mick is credited as a guest artist. Paul Butterfield is on there, too, & Mayall's harmonica is second to none.

I think when the Sotch/Irish immigrated to the U.S. during the mid/late 19th century famine, that heavily influenced what would become American folk music, & that's the banjo connection. I'd never really thought about it before, but while Lindsay's Fleetwood Mac was easily the more "modern" sounding incarnation, Lindsay's playing was a style that long predated the blues that Peter was interpreting. It's also interesting that Peter was playing a style that was geographically closer to Lindsay, & Lindsay was playing a style that was geographically closer to Peter.

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