Fleetwood Mac are a British-American rock band, formed in London in 1967. Fleetwood Mac was founded by guitarists and vocalists Peter Green and Jeremy Spencer and drummer Mick Fleetwood. Bob Brunning was hired as a temporary bass guitarist before John McVie joined the line-up in time for their eponymous debut album. Danny Kirwan joined as a third guitarist and vocalist in 1968. Keyboardist and vocalist Christine Perfect, who contributed as a session musician starting with the band's second album, married McVie and joined Fleetwood Mac as a full member in 1970, becoming known as Christine McVie.
During the 1980s Fleetwood Mac only released two albums, 1982’s Mirage, which topped the US album charts, and 1987’s Tango In The Night, which saw the band top the UK album charts with sales to date topping 2.5m alone in the UK.
While there’s no question that Fleetwood Mac operated as a machine of soul, melody, and harmony, their interpersonal woes kept them from consistently cleaving together. Drinking, substance abuse, wrecked romances, and creative differences bedeviled the band for years.
After the group splintered in the late-1980s, it took a request from a US President to fix it, if only temporarily. The underlying tension between the band members' individual and group efforts - the truth that they worked best together but could only do so for limited periods - continues to the present day and reflects that even more so than the 1970s, the 1980s were the pivotal decade for Fleetwood Mac.
