Despite their onstage pretence to be close friends and inextricably linked, walking on hand in hand and singing to each other, Fleetwood Mac’s shawl-loving singer Stevie Nicks revealed that her relationship with bandmate and ex-boyfriend Lindsey Buckingham remains tense.
“Relations with Lindsey are exactly as they have been since we broke up,” said Nicks, in an interview with Rolling Stone. “He and I will always be antagonising to each other, and we will always do things that will irritate each other, and we really know how to push each other’s buttons.”
Nicks and Buckingham joining Fleetwood Mac was the precursor to their period of greatest commercial success, following the release of their eponymous album in 1975. By the time 1977’s Rumours was released, and spawned four hit singles that catapulted the band – complete with a poppier sound – to stadium-gig fame, Nicks and Buckingham’s romantic relationship had fallen apart, and was documented on the album in songs such as Nicks’s Dreams and Buckingham’s Go Your Own Way.
During the peak of their Rumours-era stardom, the members of Fleetwood Mac earned a reputation for enduring a series of volatile and tumultuous relationships and breakups. Founding member Mick Fleetwood discovered his wife had cheated on him, with his best friend. Bassist John McVie and songwriting keyboard player Christine McVie split, and Christine wrote the song You Make Loving Fun about her new boyfriend, who was part of the band’s touring organisation. Nicks and Fleetwood briefly dated.
“We know exactly what to say when we really want to throw a dagger in,” Nicks said of she and Buckingham. “And I think that that’s not different now than it was when we were 20. And I don’t think it will be different when we’re 80.”
Even with their personal ups and downs, Fleetwood Mac reunited in 2013 to record an album, and begin a series of tours. Christine McVie returned, after leaving the band in 1998, joining John McVie, Nicks, Buckingham and Fleetwood. The five-piece are currently on a North American tour. They are due to play London’s O2 Arena in May.
