Lindsey Buckingham: ‘I think there’s a better way for Fleetwood Mac to finish up’

Sign up to Roisin O’Connor’s free weekly newsletter Now Hear This for the inside track on all things music Get our Now Hear This email for free Get our Now Hear This email for free SIGN UP I would like to be emailed about offers, events and updates from The Independent. Buckingham found out the bad news when he tried to speak and realised he couldn’t raise his voice above a hoarse whisper: Someone had been “a little rough with the breathing tube,” as he put it, and damaged his vocal cords – not just any vocal cords, but those of the onetime Fleetwood Mac yelper responsible for such modern pop standards as “Go Your Own Way”, “Second Hand News” and “Never Going Back Again”. Buckingham told him, “OK, well, I guess I’ve got to make some solo albums.” open image in gallery With then-bandmates Christine McVie and Mick Fleetwood onstage in New York, 2018 Buckingham was able to release his first two – the taut Law and Order and the angular Go Insane – while still in the band, but after recording Fleetwood Mac’s 1987 blockbuster Tango in the Night, he took a decade-long leave to fulfil himself personally and artistically. As he tells it, the latest tensions began simmering in 2017 when he asked to postpone a proposed Fleetwood Mac outing by three months so he could release and promote a solo album: “At least one person in the band” – his eternal ex Stevie Nicks, he clarified – “wasn’t very receptive to that.” open image in gallery With former partner and Fleetwood Mac bandmate Stevie Nicks in 2014 But things boiled over in January 2018 during what Fleetwood Mac fans now simply refer to as “the smirking incident”. “Somehow,” Fleetwood said, “I would love the elements that are not healed to be healed.” Nicks is another matter: save for a brief email she sent to Buckingham after his bypass, the two haven’t spoken.