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Fleetwood Mac · S2 E5
Mystery to Me
Bob Welch brings polish and warmth. The band sounds different now, no longer chasing blues
1973, a rented estate in the English countryside. Bob Welch plays a guitar line so strange and circular that the room goes silent, and the song he is building will become the most hypnotic thing Fleetwood Mac has ever recorded.
Fleetwood Mac, "Hypnotized" (Mystery to Me, 1973). The signature Bob Welch track and the moment this version of the band finds its identity. Dreamy, atmospheric, and completely detached from anything resembling the blues.
Mystery to Me: The File
“Bob brought a calm to the band that we desperately needed. He never tried to be Peter or Danny. He was himself, and that turned out to be exactly what saved us.”
— Mick Fleetwood, "Fleetwood: My Life and Adventures in Fleetwood Mac," 1990
The Heist
In early 1974, the band's manager Clifford Davis decides he owns the name Fleetwood Mac, not the musicians. He files a lawsuit and assembles a group of unknown session players to tour America as the "real" Fleetwood Mac. The actual band is trapped in legal limbo, unable to perform under their own name.
TAP TO REVEAL: What is the most brazen act of fraud in rock history?
What did manager Clifford Davis do after Mystery to Me was released?
Believe Me (Fleetwood Mac)
A Christine McVie track from Mystery to Me that shows the other half of this era's songwriting partnership. Where Welch drifts and dreams, Christine grounds and aches. Warm piano, a vocal full of quiet longing, and a melody that sticks for days.
Believe Me, Fleetwood Mac (1973)
Read the lyrics while you listen. Christine writing about longing with the kind of warmth that makes you believe every word.
Broke, exhausted, and running out of ideas. Next: Heroes Are Hard to Find, the album that proves Bob Welch has taken this band as far as he can.
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