As a Single LP 2: Fleetwood Mac, Tusk

A recurrence of a segment! Other than Dave's parody, that is. I do have a number of these truncated albums stored as Spotify playlists, but they each need a bit of backstory. (If only someone would abridge Whitney's backstory like he does the music...) So let's dig into the next one. 

Artist: Fleetwood Mac

Album: Tusk

Released: October 12, 1979

Length: 1 hour, 14 minutes

Vinyl Discs: 2

Backstory: By now, the saga of Fleetwood Mac is well-worn, overly-trod ground. But what a story is theirs! It really has it all... short of a murder, perhaps. 

On the surface, the Mac story is simply:

• Blues band forms in London in '67 
• Named after drummer Mick Fleetwood and bassist John McVie

• 

  The orig

  Some records, some repute, a couple of surprise hits 
  
• Founder/leader Peter Green departs three years later
• Blues no longer, pop all the way
• Additions, subtractions; Bob Welch and Mac's wife sustain them
• Some records, some repute, a couple of pop hits
• More lineup changes and disarray, until...
• Lindsey and Stevie join the band in 1975!
• The rest is pop history.

Oh, wait. That's when it got really crazy. Chart-toppers, international stardom, millions upon  millions of dollars, cocaine, drama, bad breakups within the two intra-band couples, cocaine, in-fighting, resignations, expulsions, cocaine, affairs within and without the band, time off, comebacks, everyone banging everyone, and cocaine. And that's the tip of the iceberg.

One year ago, Apple Original Films announced that there was a Fleetwood Mac documentary in development. One of those "definitive" ones. Seminal. All that. [Not a single piece of news on that rock doc in the year since. Oh well. My guess is that the loony Mac-ers make any such endeavor... difficult. ] But we shall see. Until then, you have this. 

One story about Fleetwood Mac:

• 2 weeks into their 1973 tour, the band found out that guitarist Bob Weston was sleeping with Mick Fleetwood's wife Jenny Boyd.
• Jenny Boyd's sister is Pattie Boyd, George Harrison's former wife. George wrote "Something" and other songs about her. 
• ...but Eric Clapton, one of his best friends, was in love with her and wrote "Layla" about her. 
• She eventually left the Quiet Beatle for Slowhand, and he wrote "Wonderful Tonight" about her. 
• Can anyone claim to have more rock hits written about them? What a muse. 
• The '73 US tour was immediately cancelled whilst in Lincoln, NE. And it wasn't just that Weston was sacked; the band was done. With a couple of dozen tour dates unfulfilled. 
• Then... amazingly... Mac manager Clifford Davis "claimed that he owned the name 'Fleetwood Mac' and the right to choose the band members." And so he threw together a band of randos to go out and play Fleetwood Mac songs at those shows. 
• That lasted... not very long.
• Fleetwood and the Macs had to sue to play as Fleetwood Mac. Took a year to settle. This strikes me as even more insane than when John Fogerty was sued for sounding too much like himself. 
• That lawsuit debacle gave them time to clear their heads and forced them to relocate to California. Which led to the intro of Mick Fleetwood and Lindsey Buckingham and Stevie Nicks... as highlighted in the music doc Sound City. Reviewed expertly here. 

Another story about Fleetwood Mac:

• 
  During this Tusk era, the band was partying so hard that when Christine McVie started dating Beach Boy Dennis Wilson -- a partier legendary on this plant and maybe several others -- those close to Wilson later said that the extreme coke life that FMac had going on trampolined him into a next-level state that continued until his terrible wasteful and sad demise in 1983. If you can one-up a friggin' Beach Boy with your drug habit... Jesus, man. 
  
• #shouldabeenmike

So... Tusk. 1975, the renewed Fleetwood Mac lineup comes out with an eponymously titled record. Massive hit. Two years later, after the romantic implosions could've ripped the band apart actually made them creative wellsprings, Rumours. Which made the prior album look like a Random Idiots release. There are big hits and then there is this one.

As sober as 1977 got

Two more years of touring, cashing checks, and Tony Montana facedives, but then it's time for a new album. How do you follow-up a megasmash?

By basically fucking off and dicking around in the studio and having little splintered factions of the full band get together here and there! 

For other acts, this would be catastrophic, but when you are a band of ace songwriters and seasoned players at the top of their game... even a misstep sells 4 million copies and has some good shit on it. 

It was certainly categorically rougher than the smewthe mewsic on Rumours. And it lacked the catchiest of melodies and wicked sharp FU heartbreak lyrics. But mainly, it was just too damn long. You try to rein in a band that just sold 10 million copies with their last go at it. Double album it is!

There were stories about using studio trash cans as percussion instruments and such. And tracks rough-cut at home studios, then brought into the fancy digs and... kept pretty much as is. There was a sense of being more new wave and... well, not punk, but with a somewhat punk DIY approach. (As much as this band could muster that.) Plus band members generally hung over or messed up all the while, and a plethora of guests stopping by, and the usual madness when a high-profile rock and roll band does anything. 

Tusk era... yikes

But they pulled off what is mostly an unsung but worthy effort. Give it a listen... as reduced to a single LP!

My story: My folks didn't have Tusk in the record collection, the one I raided routinely from 1982-1988 (and later inherited). The self-titled and Rumours, of course. But I never heard this sprawling set back then. 

In college, you got access to exponentially more music, and freshman year someone lent our buddy Hightower Tusk on CD. (Let's face it, he "borrowed" it and still has it somewhere.) With the aid of Milwaukee's Best, we blared the title track ad nauseum on the hall. The story of the USC marching band at Dodger Stadium was phenomenal. (Check out Stevie's baton twirling.)

Fast forward to 2003. Camper van Beethoven had just reunited after a decade of dormancy (and Cracker spawning), an event worthy of saluting with my attendance at a couple of their live shows. Soon thereafter, a new CD of theirs appeared on shelves... Tusk. A note for note rendering of Camper van playing the Mac. Weird. 

(The liner notes said they'd uncovered the tapes from a snowed-in weekend in 1986. Not true, it turned out -- this was done when they got together in 2002 to bone up on their CvB tunes after reforming and just went ahead and did this. Weirder.)

I bought it, predictably. Oh, the disposable income back then. It's a mess, but fun, sort of. Kind of. I mean, it's Lowery belting out the Buckingham./Nicks/McVie lyrics without the benefit of their vocal prowess and strewn together instrumentation. It's reasonably cool. 

And most importantly, it made me go back and dig into the original for the first time. Like Mikey, I liked it! But it was long and sprawling. Not cohesive and taut. 

What if, though...?

   

Last rec: as always, listen to it loud. 

Fleetwood Mac, Tusk on One Record

Side A (22:08)

1. The Ledge 

This is my second-favorite rock song called "The Ledge," I really dig this loose sound. This is not the high-production gloss of the Mac that you hear on albums that immediately preceded or followed Tusk. It is layered only with Lindsey Buckingham's madness. He got rid of everyone else's takes at his song and kept his home studio output on all instruments and vocals. Well, the official lineup on this song is: 

    Lindsey Buckingham – guitars, bass, drums, lead and backing vocals

    Mick Fleetwood – possible snare drum

Awesome. Punkish rock anti-pop and the perfect way to start this insane record. 

2. Think About Me

Veering right back into the expected F-Mac production... albeit with a wee touch of muscle and some cool Christine McVie lyrics. She is missed.   

3. Sara

Now this sounds like Fleetwood Mac. Stevie lilting over Lindsey's electric and acoustics. Some ethereal back vox. A song either about Nicks' baby with Don Henley that never was, or her best friend Sara who slept with Mick Fleetwood while Stevie was doing the same. Either way, it's the one real hit from this mess of a release.

4. That's All for Everyone

Yep, everyone. Well, not everyone -- Buckingham was responsible for lead and backing vocals, electric guitars, charango, kalimba, additional bass guitar, piano, drums, and percussion. The rest of his mates chimed in where they could. It's the "fun" in "dysfunctional."

5. I Know I'm Not Wrong

This one didn't even have the trimmings of Stevie, Christine, John, or Mick helping out. LB plays everything, including harmonica. And yet with a chorus: "Don't blame me / Please be strong / I know I'm not wrong." Effffff you guys. No song was ever more Lindsey Buckingham.  

6. Sisters of the Moon

We will round out our Side A with some more Stevie. A haunting little number thanks to her crooning and Lindsey's Strat work. A good tune released as an unsuccessful single. (A theme.)

Side B (18:44)

1. What Makes You Think You're the One

We'll start the second side of the record just like we did the first. Loose and rude Lindsey B. Tusk producer Ken Caillat claims that Buckingham took aim at his ex-lover in this song and "imitated Stevie's distinctive vibrato, giving it a bleating, goat-like quality, and her rudimentary piano quality, which he knew made her self conscious." Not very nice. 

2. Over & Over 

Again, we slide back into the lovely Christine. Silky. This song led off the double-album Tusk. What a head fake. I won't do that to listeners!

3. Not That Funny

Wait. Wait a minute. Is this Lindsey Buckingham singing "Don't blame me" yet again?? In not even a distant cousin relative of "I Know I'm Not Wrong," but more of a half-sister kind of way? Unreal. Apparently someone felt like a pariah in 1979. This amuses me greatly. 

4. Walk a Thin Line

A much sweeter sound than lyric. According to Wikipedia, "Walk a Thin Line" was inspired by a Charlie Watts drum fill on "Sway", from the Rolling Stones album Sticky Fingers. This drum fill caught Buckingham's interest, and he intended to feature the part on one of his Tusk songs. Now ya know. 

5. Tusk

This is one of my favorite rock songs of all time, just for the pure fun of it. A great album closer. Should've been, now it is. 

Enjoy.

As a Single LP 1: George Harrison, All Things Must Pass

Artist: George Harrison

Album: All Things Must Pass

Released: November 27, 1970

Length: 2 hours, 5 minutes

Vinyl Discs: 3

Might as well start with a doozy, right? 2 hours. 3 LP's. Whew.

Backstory: George, known as the quiet Beatle, or if you watched the Get Back documentary, the super whiny one that Paul pushed around, had a treasure trove full of tunes by the time the Beatles busted up in the year of our tiny dictator’s birth (Anno Dictato 1970). 

And… he put them all . . . all . . . all on this record! All of them! Include some Sides E and F sludge. Man. 

George was in a truly spiritual frame of mind in the late 60’s. He was hanging with Norah Jones’ dad and meditating and taking some acid and most relevantly, incorporating a sitar and other Indian classical instruments into rock and roll. It wasn't just the sound of it, though. He was imbued with religion and Hare Krishna and peace on earth. 

The lyrics of All Things Must Pass are mostly about: God, loving God, praying, and really loving God. You hear a song and start to think it’s an ode to a gal, and ah yeah, it’s instead a paean to a god. Which is obviously perfectly fine. There just isn’t a ton of complex lyrical content. All Things Must Pass is really about one thing. Dear lord. 

When you’re a Beatle (you’re a Beatle all the way?), you have lots of things:

Talent. 

Money. 

Fame. 

Wives.

Gold records.

Access to famous recording studios and producers.

But also really gifted friends. Ones who will oblige you and play on your records. This album is star-studded, to include:

• his future wife-swipin' buddy Eric Clapton
• 5th Beatle Billy Preston
• 4th Beatle Ringo Starr
• Gary Wright ("Dream Weaver," "Love Is Alive")
• Klaus Voormann, German bassman extraordinaire
• Jim Gordon, stud drummer til he lost his fucking shit
• Peter Frampton, age 20
• Pete Drake, pedal steel (played on "Lay Lady Lay," "Stand By Your Man" so many more)
• Badfinger dudes
• Bobby Keys, super sax man on Exile and 100 others

Hell, it goes on, see here -- to the point where Dave Mason said he doesn't know what tracks he's on because "there were so many people in the studio." So they all got together in London town and pumped out a plethora of rock music. 

My story: I never really listened to this album before this year. Everyone knows “My Sweet Lord,” and a few of you know about the landmark lawsuit that the Chiffons’ levied at George for ripping off their hit “He’s So Fine.” Score 1 for ABKCO, later seen destroying The Verve.

Other tracks you know from this solo debut include the title track and especially the stellar “What Is Life" -- my favorite all-time George-solo tune and one immortalized in Goodfellas.

   

I am mostly a post-Beatles fan of Paul and Wings, even with some of his slight fare and silly love songs (actually love that one).  Over the last couple of years, I have honed in on Lennon's work before and after his "Long Weekend" and Hollywood Vampires stint and A Toot and a Snore in '74 sagas -- a chapter of Whitneypedia worth mining another time. 

And Ringo is just Ringo, god bless 'im. You can hear everything worthy he's done since 1970 in 14 good minutes. ("Photograph" is outstanding, albeit footnoted with Harrison's co-write.)

George? I never gave him the time. Even though his name is G(h)eorg(h)e.  I know.

Until this project. And I'm glad I dug in. Here we go, with a newly re-arranged and massively truncated album that rivals any Après-Beatle offering. 

George Harrison, All Things Must Pass as a Single LP

Side A (22:12)

1. What Is Life 

This song just seems like a killer album opener to me. And so it is now. 

2. I Live for You

I follow it up with… an outtake? Yep, good shit. Pete Drake pedal steel. Get some. 

3. My Sweet Lord

At #3, we go with the big hit. Hare Hare Krishna Krishna, the thing about the Lord, he’s so fine. 

4. Ballad of Sir Frankie Crisp (Let It Roll)

My favorite discovery on this little journey! Frank Crisp, a “microscopist,” and the original owner of Harrison’s London home. Now that is lyrical fun! Love this tune. Let it roll, indeed. 

5. Run of the Mill

Now this one really deviates from the peace and love! A nifty little tune with some brass, it sounds pretty Beatles-y. Maybe because it was written when the Fab Four were breaking up; it’s a major slap squarely at Paul. Love it. You go, George. 

6. Awaiting on You All

Okay, let’s hustle back to the pew. A rocking little number. Lyrics remind me of our pal Hightower’s ex-gal Allison, who’d joined a cult and shaved her head in the late 1990’s. He went to see her and was catching up, and he told her he was a schoolteacher. She replied curtly, “Okay, but wouldn’t it be better if you were teaching people to chant to God?” 

Side B (20:19)

1. Isn't It a Pity (Version 1)

A lovely song. A long song. A Phil Spector-long song. It’s 7:11. You know, like they were recording so long, so late at night, they had to go get Twinkies and burritos and Cokes and then made the song that runtime. Ringo, Billy Preston, Gary Wright. Version 2 is shorter and has Clapton. Eh, I like this one.

2. If Not for You 

A cover of a Dylan tune. Is it a cover if it’s by your friend and he only released it one month prior? I don’t know. I like George’s version way better. A toe tapper, and his slide sounds great. Listen for a young Peter Frampton on acoustic guitar. (If you can.) 

3. Hear Me Lord

Really enjoy this one. This is a beautiful spiritual with killer keys (piano, keyboard, and amazing organ) and some electric licks from E.C. A great cut. 

4. All Things Must Pass

Closing it out with the title track. I wish I loved this song more than I do, but it’s integral to the album and a good message for today.

Wow. What a tight little banger. Wait, what? Seriously, though, it's too bad Sir Martin, a gheorghe in his own right, didn't stop by Abbey Road Studios in the summer of '70 and hack away at the scraps to make this sharp piece of British steel. 42 minutes and 31 seconds lean. 

Listen away until the next time. Let it roll.

New Recurring Feature: Les Coole's As a Single LP Series

Bloated. Self-indulgent. Lacking self-control and self-awareness. A massive ego trip. 

These are labels often used to describe (a) me, (b) my blog posts, and, most pertinently, (c) double and triple albums throughout rock'n'roll history. Yes, for decades, 99.9% of original release pop and rock LP records were single vinyl discs to be played at 33⅓ rpm, and they usually held 20 to 22, no more than 23 minutes a side. Along the way, though, there were occasional, more robust submissions of multiple discs – those in the .1% – with varying success. 

[Of Note: compilation and live albums are exempted for obvious reasons. They can and should go long. Doy.] 

The Double Album. What a statement. Our work cannot be contained within a single disc! We have more! You need more! The push-back from fans and critics often would become a personal statement about the artist(s), like “The audacity that you wouldn’t pare this down to the standard listening length! Where is your sense of rock album decorum?” 

And let’s face it, sometimes that backlash is warranted. Sometimes recording artists need someone tastefully judicious like George Martin or Rick Rubin sitting there going, “ Nope… nope… nope…” and x-ing out the tracks that clutter up what could be a svelte, sleek piece of musical brilliance. 

The artists need that, but they don’t always get that. You have people like Billy Corgan musing, “We had one solid record and one hit record… let’s go massive double album, baby!” And while I’m sure someone at Pumpkinland (actual studio name) at that time must have told him he shouldn’t, nobody told him he couldn’t. 2 hours and 1 minute of Pumpkins. Phew. 

Then, sometimes you’re The Clash, who boldly released the punk rock Hall of Fame double album London Calling (1 hr 5 mins) in 1979 to incredible fanfare! Success against the odds! And then, validated, just threw the kitchen sink onto tape onto their triple album Sandinista! a year later and didn’t hold back (2 hrs 24 mins). Wowsers. 

For all of that, there are instances when the scope creep does work. In addition to the aforementioned magnum opus from The Only Band That Matters, London Calling, the Stones’ high-water mark to a vast number of fans and critics is Exile on Main Street (1 hr 7 mins). Others are out there. Tommy. The Wall. Songs in the Key of Life. 

Goodbye Vinyl Brick Road 

When vinyl fully gave way to cassette along the way in the 1980’s, the double album became less of a big deal. For one thing, it happened less frequently – there was no decade in music as senselessly sprawling, as dilated and diluted with decadence as the 1970’s. Punk rock at its inceptive core was at least in part an angry reaction to 10-minute epic raga saga songs on double albums belted out in flairs and heels with feathered butt cuts. Punk begat new wave, and the 1980’s were a go. (“It's called the 80's, and it's gonna be around forever!”) 

Brevity was suddenly the wit of soul, rock, pop, and other genres in the 80’s. [Except for reggae. And “Purple Rain.” And “Rock Me Amadeus (Salieri Version).”]

Also, cassettes could handle the load on one unit! For the most part, cassette tapes could run up to 45 minutes a side, so even The Minutemen’s Double Nickels on the Dime and its whopping 43 songs was a single tape! (They’re short songs… 1 hr 14 mins.) But wow! 

[Oh, but not Sandinista. That’s two tapes, buddy. Talk about extravagant, boyo.] 

In this cool new medium, runtimes on tapes could elevate beyond the previously established ceilings and nobody really knew or cared. In fact, with the advent of dual cassette stereos and boomboxes, you could have a Maxell (way better than Memorex) 90-minuter with Murmur on one side and Reckoning on the other! And I did! 

Those were great days. Oh, minus the underreported impact from the loss of amazing album art, as liner notes and gatefold album covers were basically eradicated. Also crappy was the inevitable snapping of the tape and the resplicing with scotch tape and a pencil. And the eventual faded warble that cassettes’ sonic brilliance became with overuse. But hey, no scratches like on records! Glad that scratches are gone for good! Oh. Wait for it… 

All Music Media Things Must Pass 

Ah, yes. Then came CD’s. Mind-blowing for the audiophiles. 

Compact discs in the late 80’s and early 90’s were another sea change for squeezing albums onto media. Roughly 74 to 80 minutes on music, so a number of the “double albums” in the original issuance became 2-CD sets. (A little better for album art; still not the same.) 

ooh, the original master recording

Multi-disc releases were boxed and organized a number of different ways, from the big fat double jewel case (could handle 3 or 4 discs but usually just a deuce) to cardboard experimentation to just 4 CD cases that get strewn about in your collection and lost. 

Lose Your Illusion 

So I give short shrift to double albums on CD. Even moreso for streaming. By a looong shot. Doesn’t matter any more. Feels like progress, eh? It’s not. Hell, albums of any kind are secondary items. All the world’s a jukebox and we are merely players of that jukebox now. Only Mr. KQ and a few others spend quiet time with an album and its art. Kudos to that. 

And the seemingly arbitrary time limits of yesteryear? Well, they protected us from overlong kitchen-sink stuff. Hey folk, here’s the demo of the 1st-take acoustic (with oboe) instrumental version of “Layla.” And then Takes 2 and 3 of that. Sweet. 

You know what’s better? Concise? Taut? Crisp? Powerful? Sharp? 

23 minutes on Side A. 

23 minutes on Side B. 

Flip it. Flip it again, if it’s really good shit. 

So… the current malaise has to be remedied. Who's gonna do it? You? You, Lieutenant Marls? I have a greater responsibility to our collective gheorghian music entertainment than you can possibly fathom. 

As such, without anyone asking for it, this is an exercise I have performed for you, albeit one that’s been done – not to death, but ad nauseum in certain music forum spaces on the world wide web. And everyone out there has different opinions, as it damn well should be. So therefore I cannot offer a definitive take on it . . . except that I’ve been hanging with Dave for 37 years so far and so, therefore, this is indeed truly definitive! 

I offer you a premier look at: 

Les Coole’s The “As a Single LP” Project 

:wherein I take double and triple albums of the rock and roll canon and give you a pared-down, svelte, bad-assed rendering of what these records would be like on a single vinyl platter. As in, a Side A and a Side B.  Wander down the road with me if you will. 

Stay tuned. Like right away, the first edition is set to pop, accompanying this post 1-2 like . . . like it's a . . . yep.  A double album.