Fleetwood Mac - BBC Sessions, Volume 1, 1967-1968

Fleetwood Mac performed for the BBC many times from 1967 to 1971. I've compiled six albums of their BBC material. This is the first one. If you're a fan of their Peter Green-led blues era, you really should listen to these.

The official release of Fleetwood Mac's BBC performances over the years has been very frustrating. In 1995, a double album called "Live at the BBC" was released. That was very good, except for the fact that it was a mere double album, and I've compiled six albums. (Plus, there are even more performances available only via low quality bootleg recordings, or haven't been made public at all.) Some other performances trickled out over the years, a couple of this archival album, a few more on another one, etc...

Then, in 2019, there were two new releases that promised more. The album "BBC Sessions 1968" was released. That one also is good, except it is only a single album that merely deals with some of their performances from 1968. Worse, it was only a Record Store Day limited release, and it's very hard to find. It took me nearly a year before I could find a copy.

The other 2019 release, "Before the Beginning," is a travesty, and I don't use that word lightly. Even the very title is an insult, implying that all the great Fleetwood Mac music before their highly successful pop phase starting in 1975 hardly counts, and thus is "before the beginning." Most of it comes from two concerts which the liner notes claim are from unknown sources, but bootleggers know which shows those were. Then the record company layered a loop of audience noise over the entire thing! That was a dumb practice that went out of fashion around 1966, and for good reason. It makes everything sound worse, definitely worse than the bootleg versions of the exact same material. But they weren't done yet. They also included some vaguely dated "studio demos" that in fact were BBC performances. The whole thing was a joke and an insult.

Sadly, that release shows how little the band's curators think of the Peter Green era. So I'm highly doubtful that a proper and comprehensive official release of the BBC performances will be seen any time soon. Luckily, we have bootlegs. A majority of the takes in my series are from bootlegs, yet their sound is generally very good. (The ones that aren't have been demoted to bonus tracks.)

For this first volume, only four of the songs are officially unreleased. For two of those, some people might argue they don't belong here, because they're not Fleetwood Mac at all. I've found some BBC performances of the blues band Chicken Shack. Future star Christine McVie (then known as Christine Perfect) was the keyboardist and occasional lead singer for Chicken Shack for a couple of years before she officially joined Fleetwood Mac in 1970. I say "officially" because she began playing for Fleetwood Mac as a session musician in 1968, and married the band's bass player, John McVie, so she slowly before a de facto band member before it became official. Thus, in light of her later long-time connection to the band, I consider the Chicken Shack songs where she sang lead vocals fair game for this series. The two songs she did here are songs she never recorded in the studio with either Chicken Shack or Fleetwood Mac, so they're especially interesting. I'll have a few more from her Chicken Shack days on later volumes.

By the way, one of those songs, "It's OK with Me Baby," initially sounded terrible, and still sounds problematic in spots. The sound was fine in general, except that the song changed pitch several times, and for long stretches. I was able to fix most of those problems, but you can still hear some brief wobbly parts, including the first few seconds. Trust me, it sounds way better than it did before.

The rest of this album is pretty straightforward, with lots of great bluesy guitar work. The band did a few more songs at the BBC in this time frame with an obscure blue singer named Eddie Boyd. I didn't include those because Boyd sang lead and they'd belong more properly on an Eddie Boyd album. But I did include one, "The Stroller," because it's an instrumental that prominently features Green's guitar soloing.

There's one more thing I want to point out. I've already posted a bunch of stray tracks compilations from this band. Many BBC performances were included on those - more than twenty! - because early Fleetwood Mac played lots of songs that they never released on any studio recording, and the BBC versions have the best sound quality, by far. I was torn whether to include those exact same versions in this series or not. I ultimately decided to do so, because I've never seen all of the band's BBC performances collected in one place, not even on bootleg. So, my apologies about some duplication here and there.

UPDATE:  On March 7, 2020, I updated the mp3 download file. It turns out the song I had listed as being "Baby Please Set a Date" was actually the song "A Fool No More." Both were on the official BBC album mentioned above. So I replaced the wrong song with the right one, and added the song that I'd missed.

UPDATE 2: On July 30, 2020, I updated the album again. This time, I didn't add or remove any songs. However, I found better sounding versions for a bunch of them, so you should get the revised version. Sorry I didn't keep track of which versions were improved.

01. Long Grey Mare (Fleetwood Mac)
02. Looking for Somebody (Fleetwood Mac)
03. Believe My Time Ain't Long (Fleetwood Mac)
04. Baby Please Set a Date (Fleetwood Mac)
05. Got to Move (Fleetwood Mac)
06. A Fool No More (Fleetwood Mac)
07. When the Train Comes Home (Christine McVie & Chicken Shack)
08. It's OK with Me Baby [Edit] (Christine McVie & Chicken Shack)
09. The Stroller [Instrumental] (Fleetwood Mac & Eddie Boyd)
10. The Sun Is Shining (Fleetwood Mac)
11. Don't Be Cruel (Fleetwood Mac)
12. Sweet Little Angel (Fleetwood Mac)
13. The World Keep On Turning (Fleetwood Mac)
14. I Can't Hold Out (Fleetwood Mac)
15. Mean Old World (Fleetwood Mac)
16. Black Magic Woman (Fleetwood Mac)
17. Peggy Sue Got Married (Fleetwood Mac)
18. Please Find My Baby (Fleetwood Mac)

https://www101.zippyshare.com/v/6z3AuY1h/file.html

For the cover art photo, I couldn't find any good color ones of the band in 1967, and very few in 1968. I used one from 1968. I wish I had them on stage or in the studio, but this was all I could find.