Wouldn't it be nice if Fleetwood Mac totally reinvented itself yet again.
All their iterations are interesting, but they were so successful in the Buckingham/Nicks period that they've been doing that material/vibe forever.
New blood might be just what they need.
That was the biggest take-away I got from Fleetwood's bio.
At one point I think it was during the Welch period, he and McVie decided that they would do whatever it took to maintain Fleetwood Mac as an ongoing enterprise: new blood
would be assimilated as needed.
So this is simply ""business as usual" for them.
Just to clarify, the original lineup was two guitarists, Peter Green and Jeremy Spencer, with Danny Kirwan joining later. They went back to two guitarists when Peter Green left. Peter Green briefly rejoined the band, to complete a tour, when Jeremy Spencer suddenly left to join a religious cult (The Children of God), before Bob Welch was brought in as a permanent replacement.
Yes, although Fleetwood describes it as more akin to an abduction of an extremely psychically vulnerable Spencer.
Went out for a walk one afternoon and never showed up for that night's gig in LA, IIRC.
When he was finally located the cult actually tried to hide him.
This was eerily similar to the scenario which led to Green leaving the band earlier that year in Germany.
Fleetwood's bio is a treasure trove of info about their very early days and that poorly documented early '70's period, and even busts some myths about the "Big Mac" period.
Tellingly though, he gives very short shrift to the Welch period.
There was a royalties law suit brought by Welch, detailed on his Wiki page.
Who the hell is Bob Welch?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Welch_(musician)
My personal favorite period was the one that spawned "Oh Well" and "Green Manalishi", the late Peter Green period.
Paul McCartney even cops to having lifted the introductory riff to "Sun King" on
Abbey Road from Green's "Albatross".
And although Fleetwood and McVie have been the band's continuous backbone since day one (well, a little bit after in McVie's case), let's not forget their original name was
Peter Green's Fleetwood Mac.
Hardcore Green fans might be interested in his little-known and severely overlooked solo album,
The End of the Game.
Fans of that late Green period should look up the Boston Tea Party concerts available on CD in the last few years, it was manna from heaven when I first stumbled across it:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Live_in_Boston_(Fleetwood_Mac_album).