Newly-Released Live Album, ‘Fleetwood Mac: Mirage Tour ’82’ Finds the Band’s Historically Fractious Lineup at their Harmonious Best

One of the things that made Fleetwood Mac’s eminent lineup enduringly endearing, was that, amid all of the turmoil, the Nicks-Buckingham-McVie-McVie-Fleetwood version of the band remained an indelibly good, often transcendent live act.

A newly released live album, Fleetwood Mac: Mirage Tour ’82, available on 3LP, 2CD and digital formats from Rhino, finds the band on the heels of their return to soft-rock dominance, and, if not at the height of their post-Rumours popularity, in top-flight musically.

As makers of some of the most-approachable, radio-ready rock of their, or any, era, Fleetwood Mac’s music was always imbued with pop’s prerequisite melodrama. But the band’s wildly-messy internal relationships — intrigue for countless books and, of late, inspiration for prestige television and Broadway productions — added authentic layers of spectacle to songs that otherwise recount rather typical matters of the heart.

Again, for those interested in a deep dive, there are innumerable books that impart the creative deluge, internal tumult and historic overindulgence the band experienced between 1975’s self-titled record (the first featuring the noted quintet) and 1987’s Tango in the Night. A surface-level recounting, though, would go something like this: Between the release of Fleetwood Mac and the recording of Rumours, Christine (keys and vocals) and John McVie (bass) divorced; Lindsey Buckingham (guitar, voicals) and Stevie Nicks (vocals, tambourine, cape) broke up; Mick Fleetwood (drums), the band’s happy warrior, in the midst of his own divorce, had begun a short-lived affair with Nicks. In the years that followed, the group released three more relatively successful albums between hiatuses. Tens-of-millions of records were sold. Mountains of cocaine were consumed. Exorbitant hospitality bills were run up. Nicks had to have a white grand piano in every hotel suite. Etc, etc, etc. Charli XCX may have instituted BRAT summer. Fleetwood Mac had a BRAT decade.

During this period, Fleetwood Mac toured consistently. And whether by sheer force of will, financial desperation or out of spite for each other, when they came together on stage, they were often quite good.

That was the clearly the case when the group, fresh off the release of Mirage, visited The Forum in the Los Angeles suburb of Inglewood, California for two nights. Compared to the world-conquering success of Rumours, the band’s 1979 follow up, the bloated double-LP Tusk, was a commercial failure (though it’s been rightly reconsidered in the decades since). Mirage was a return to form. It spent five weeks at the top of the Billboard charts and 18 weeks in the top ten.

A homecoming of sorts for Buckingham and Nicks, the band certainly aimed to please the crowd on hand at the Forum, who were likely fiending for a heavy dose of Rumours. And they kicked things off with “Secondhand News,” the first of four consecutive cuts from their 1977 opus. From the jump, Buckingham seems… well… let’s call it stimulated, shout-singing both his background and lead vocals and hamming it up on the guitar, seemingly hell-bent on taking the spotlight from Nicks, who — long-considered the band’s de-facto front-person — had become a full-blown pop star with her first solo record, Bella Donna, which debuted at number one the year before. To be clear, of the highlights on the 22-song collection, most are Nicks-sung hits, including a cinematic rendition of 1975’s “Rhiannon” and an understated performance of “Gypsy,” one of two big hits from Mirage.

Any unevenness, or incongruity to the collection largely falls in the lap of Buckingham. An unimpeachably great guitar player, harmony singer and writer, his ego is as widely corroborated as any of the band’s infamous transgressions. On a nine-minute version of the Tusk-culled, ragged-blues dud “Not that Funny” and on a breathy, toothless solo performance of the Travis-picked Rumours‘ track “Never Going Back” he sounds resolved to elbow out his peers. Though his incandescent performance on the Peter Green number “Oh Well” is a fitting tribute to one of the best guitarists of all time, Buckingham’s freakish talent is most welcome in moments of acuity — filling the spaces between stanzas with delicate melodic riffs on “Gypsy,” teaming up with Christine McVie to add harmonious “oohs” and “ahhs” to “Dreams.”

Though they don’t often take the spotlight, the band’s enduringly tight rhythm section (Fleetwood and John McVie), shine in their consistency. The catchy, pre-outro bass lead of “The Chain” does give McVie a memorable, if fleeting moment. Fleetwood, meanwhile, has never met a dynamic-throttle-down that didn’t need a snare pop, chime stroke or superfluous flourish, and he makes a point of inserting himself in many of the concert’s more intimate moments.

Christine McVie, though, is the unanimous MVP of Mirage Tour ’82. She excels as both role player and lead actor, and seems content in either scenario. The band’s performance of McVie’s “Hold Me” is quite possibly the collection’s best example of Fleetwood Mac transcending its recorded material in a live setting. What appears on Mirage as a rather tepid, saccharine ditty, is transformed on stage at the Forum into an urgent and, at turns, menacing disco-rock hybrid.

Much of the material on Mirage Tour ’82 will not be unfamiliar to hardcore fans of the band. Performances from the Forum shows were originally released on VHS in 1983 and re-released on DVD in the early 2000s. Bootlegged rips from the concert film are easily searchable on YouTube, and those interested will likely get a kick out of the band’s garb, especially when it comes to Buckingham, who has transitioned from the teased-perm and chill-AF Kimono that defined his look in the post-hippie days of Rumours to a kind of hobo chic that predates the similarly transient-inspired fashion of R.E.M.’s Michael Stipe by a solid ten years.

Still, whether Mac obsessed or Mac curious, the 22 tracks on Mirage Tour ’82 make for a compelling listen. The first-rate songwriting, the unassailable musicianship, the melodrama and the actual drama: It’s all here, as accessible as any Fleetwood Mac tune.

Fleetwood Mac: Mirage Tour ’82 is available on 3LP, 2CD and digital formats from Rhino.

Listen On: Spotify | YouTube | Apple Music