Dreams

 Dreams: The Many Lives of Fleetwood Mac by Mark Blake, 432 pgs. © 2024

It took me a bit of time to get used to the structure of this book--it's not written as a narrative history of the band but more as episodes and vignettes of the band members and the songwriting that came about--of course, filled with anecdotes about the absolute dysfunction of the group as a whole. Really, there were two Fleetwood Macs--in the mid 60's they were doing what everyone in Britain was doing at the time, chasing the American blues sound. That was before their guitarists left the band and were ultimately and, pretty much on a whim, replaced with Lindsey Buckingham and Stevie Nicks, two LA-based songwriters who were strapped for cash and looking to make it musically. Along with Christie McVie, there were now three official songwriters in the group. The band became so well known for their romantic entanglements with each other (and the copious amounts of cocaine they ingested) it's a miracle they were able to maintain the group the way they have over the decades. At a certain point, it's obvious that the band members are really just enamored of the money and lifestyle they've been able to achieve and each subsequent album and tour was really a call-to-arms for making cash, as opposed to creating something of artistic value. Be that as it may, the band were able to consistently recreate pop hits well into the late 80s. It was interesting to learn about Stevie Nicks--such a polarizing figure. I don't know how you write songs for a living when you can't play any instruments. But her voice was and is so unique--it's one of the voices you recognize immediately when you hear it. Her kitschy mysticism routine was inspried by both Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin. Throw in Buckingham's need to push the musical envelope and you have had something different entirely from anything else on the radio in 1977. 

Major Labels: A History of Popular Music in Seven Genres

 

 

Major Labels: A History of Popular Music in Seven Genres, by Kelefa Sannah, 476 pgs

This is a fun read that tracks the kinds of labels we as a culture have used to describe music genres over the years. Sennah writes about some of the most popular genres of music in the 20th century and while I had hoped for more actual historical context regarding major record labels in general, the author does a good job of taking the reader through the myriad of subgenres and micro-categories that are created by music listeners simply by way of consuming music--proto punk, alternative, sippy cup country, trap--there's seemingly no end to the labels and descriptors we'll give to even the slightest deviations and evolutions in popular music. Sennah spent a majority of his writing career covering music for the New York Times in the 2000s before moving over to the New Yorker, and he seems to put away his harshest criticism here, offering a more nuanced voice for his first non-fiction work.  Interestingly, the Rock and R&B chapters are the longest, probably because they have the most history. Sanneh recognizes he's not perfect though as he describes his first takes on Taylor Swift and Beyoncé to be less than ideal, but he has since learned that criticism is more fluid art then anything else. Recommended for adults.