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Fleetwood Mac releases first set of music since 2003

Wed, 01 May 2013 13:40:00 +0000

Without announcement, Fleetwood Mac yesterday released its first new music in a decade, available exclusively through iTunes.

The Guardian reports:

The release, simply titled Extended Play, comprises a quartet of tunes: three originals by Lindsey Buckingham and one by Stevie Nicks, written in 1973 when the pair were still the duo Buckingham Nicks. This is hardly a set of sexagenarians' basement tapes: Without You – not be confused with the Danny Kirwan-written Mac song of the same name – and Sad Angel are as shiny as Rumours, and even the lonely piano ballad, It Takes Time, has a dramatic synths/strings coda.

Buckingham revealed plans for the EP at a gig in Philadelphia earlier this month – the band have been performing some of the new songs on their current tour. "It's the best stuff we've done in a long time," he said, promising that the record would be out "in a few days". It took a few weeks, instead, but within hours of appearing on iTunes, Extended Play had appeared in the digital shop's top 10 chart, though it has since dropped.

Download it here.

Fleetwood Mac readies tour and new music

Tue, 04 Dec 2012 17:32:00 +0000

NEW YORK (AP) -- Fleetwood Mac is heading back on the road, and that means the top-selling group will release new music - sort of.

On its 34-city North American tour, which kicks off April 4 in Columbus, Ohio, the band will perform two new songs, and it could mean a new album will follow. Or not.

Stevie Nicks recently sang on tracks that Lindsey Buckingham, Mick Fleetwood and John McVie worked on, calling the sessions "great." But Nicks also says she's not sure where the band fits in today's music industry.

"Whether or not we're gonna do any more (songs), we don't know because we're so completely bummed out with the state of the music industry and the fact that nobody even wants a full record," she said. "Everybody wants two songs, so we're going to give them two songs."

Nicks said depending on the response to the new tracks - which Buckingham calls "the most Fleetwood Mac-y stuff ... in a long time" - more material could come next.

"Maybe we'll get an EP out of it or something," Buckingham said.

Nicks will continue to record solo albums, though. The group is celebrating the 35th anniversary of the best-selling "Rumours" album, which has moved some 20 million units in the United States. She knows that's not possible again, despite the success of Adele's "21," which has sold 10 million units in America in less than two years.

Washed Out crushes on Fleetwood Mac

Sat, 29 Sep 2012 13:00:00 +0000

Randall Poster: The man with perfect taste

Mon, 20 Aug 2012 18:11:00 +0000

In 1990, Randall Poster co-wrote a movie called “A Matter of Degrees,” about a would-be law student protesting the corporate takeover of his college radio station. It starred Arye Gross, Tom Sizemore and Wendell Pierce from “The Wire,” and if you’ve never heard of it, you’re among the vast majority. It’s not an especially good movie.

But it has a good soundtrack that features the Lemonheads, Uncle Tupelo, Giant Sand, fIREHOSE and Yo La Tengo. This was well before the Lemonheads became MTV mainstays, before Uncle Tupelo ushered in the alt-country movement, and before Yo La Tengo became indie-rock lifers. Twenty-two years later, the soundtrack comes across as strikingly prescient, a lasting memento of a forgettable film.

Poster executive-produced the “Matter of Degrees” soundtrack, helping choose the right songs by the right acts, and it launched a career at the gap between the music and film industries. Since then, he was worked in some capacity on more than 50 feature films and HBO series, including every Wes Anderson film, the Dylan hazyography “I’m Not There,” the glam-rock period piece “Velvet Goldmine,” and Richard Linklater’s “Suburbia” (which, like “A Matter of Degrees,” was a flawed movie that produced a great album).