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Fleetwood Mac · S2 E4
Bare Trees
Danny Kirwan smashes his guitar before a show and refuses to go on stage. He is fired that night
1972, backstage on the American tour. Danny Kirwan smashes his guitar against a wall, refuses to go on stage, then sits in the audience and heckles his own band through the entire show.
Fleetwood Mac, "Spare Me a Little of Your Love" (Bare Trees, 1972). While Danny Kirwan is falling apart, Christine McVie is quietly becoming the voice this band needs. Warm, steady, and completely in control of a song that sounds like it wrote itself.
The Unraveling
Kirwan has been coming apart for months. The drinking is constant, the mood swings are violent, and the perfectionism that once made him brilliant has turned into a rage nobody in the band can manage.
“Danny was the sweetest, most talented boy, but something inside him was broken and none of us knew how to fix it. We just watched it happen.”
— Christine McVie, interview with Mojo magazine, 2014
TAP TO REVEAL: What happened to Danny Kirwan after Fleetwood Mac fired him?
What did Danny Kirwan do backstage before the 1972 show that led to his firing?
Bare Trees: The File
Bare Trees (Fleetwood Mac)
The title track, written and sung by Danny Kirwan. A spare, acoustic piece with Kirwan's voice floating over fingerpicked guitar. One of the most quietly devastating songs in the Fleetwood Mac catalog, and knowing what happens to the man who wrote it makes every note land harder.
Bare Trees, Fleetwood Mac (1972)
Read the lyrics while you listen. Kirwan's quietest, most honest writing. Knowing what happens to him makes every word land harder.
Three guitarists down, and Bob Welch and Christine McVie are the only songwriters left standing. Next: Mystery to Me, the album where this band finally stops sounding like it is about to fall apart.
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