Obituary | Christine McVie, the soul of Fleetwood Mac

British musician Christine McVie, the blonde keyboardist for Fleetwood Mac, passed away unexpectedly on Wednesday, November 30, at the age of 79.

For a while, the Macs were the transatlantic Beatles. Between 1975 and 1987 the British-Californian quintet developed its imperial phase through five albums with rumorsand its 40 million copies sold, like the jewel in the crown.

Initially led by the prodigious guitarist Peter Green, they had burst in in 1967 as the spearhead of British blues bands. Eight years later they were going through a transitional period of discreet commercial fortune. The entry of the musical and sentimental couple made up of Lindsey Buckingham and Stevie Nicks changed their trajectory to enjoy a second debut that eclipsed the impact of all that had come before.

Buckingham was the visionary guitarist who immediately took the reins on production and arrangements. Nicks, a petite poet with a magnetic presence and distinctive voice who would become the visual focus of the band. The solidity of the rhythm section made up of the towering Mick Fleetwood and the stoic John McVie —hence the group’s name— gave the composers the guiding thread and the sound cushion for their creations.

Christine McVie —née Perfect, retained the last name after her divorce from the bassist— had already been with the group for several years and completed the trio of singer-songwriters. She was what today would be called the least media. Despite the fact that the rock soap opera was written from the separation of the two couples, theirs did not have much drama. Buckingham and Nicks’s, on the other hand, stoked public drama, staged and real, for decades, until Lindsey’s fall firing in 2018.

But half of the Greatest Hits sellers in this lineup (1988) were signed by Christine. Her voice conveyed spirituality, warmth, and a measure of whiskey. Like the other two Brits, she came from a blues band and that foundation forever defined her. From “Don’t Stop” to “Say You Love Me,” including her successful contributions to the hyperpop disco Tango in the Night (1987): “Everywhere” and “Little Lies.” As if to remind us of their reliability, albums where the group no longer had a complete quintet of aces, such as behind the mask (1990) and even the ill-fated Time (1995), house his little jewels.

Solo forays were infrequent compared to the other two. In 1999, shortly after the all-star cast was reunited, and tired of touring, she retired. Fifteen years later she would return to the fold for a few last rounds. worth listening In the Meantime (2004) and, above all, the album that bears his name and that of Buckingham (2017), which includes everyone but Nicks in a frustrating late manifestation of dysfunction. It was actually the last Fleetwood Mac record, and it lived up to its reputation.

With her unrepentant romanticism and melodic traditionalism contrasted with the mysticism of Nicks and the pop eccentricity of Buckingham, Christine woven a piece of the quilt of what is now called classic rock. Her artisans are already disappearing. Don’t stop thinking about tomorrow, Courage. And we will have to continue to obey him.

(Enrique Chavez).