Lindsey Buckingham Had a ‘My Way or the Highway’ Attitude While Recording ‘Tusk,’ Says Fleetwood Mac Producer
Lindsey Buckingham is best known for recording several albums with the long-running band Fleetwood Mac, including the 1979 record Tusk. The guitarist reportedly had a “my way or the highway” attitude while making the double album, according to a producer who worked with the band. Here’s what Buckingham’s former bandmates and the producer said about recording Tusk.
Lindsey Buckingham demanded a replica of his personal bathroom to record the Fleetwood Mac ‘Tusk’ album
Tusk was Fleetwood Mac’s 12th studio album. It was released as a double album in 1979 and featured the popular tracks “Sisters of the Moon,” “Sara,” “Think About Me,” and “Storms.”
Buckingham rehearsed several songs at home before introducing them to the band to be considered for the album. In the studio, he requested and received a replica of his personal bathroom to capture the “amazing sound” he had created at home.
“What I’m basically trying to do is take a track that we cut in the studio which has very, very dry sounds on it – no ambiance, no echo at all – and selectively, say, take the snare drums and vocals, run them through these speakers [and] mic the bathroom, which is right across the hall, which has an amazing sound: 1927 bathrooms, believe me – they’re rock ’n’ roll all the way,” Buckingham explained in studio footage from the Tusk era (per Rolling Stone). “[I] mic what’s being recorded in there and record it back on some empty tracks so that the whole song takes on a much more atmospheric sort of feel to it.”
Although it was risky and unheard of to record with a microphone dangling over a toilet, Buckingham achieved a unique sound for Tusk.
“I think Tusk is a spectacular record,” singer Stevie Nicks said in the liner notes to the album’s 2015 reissue. “We were all down with getting heavy, but Lindsey was really trying to make it weirder and heavier than any of us were able to comprehend. But we went along. We followed him up that mountain!”
A former Fleetwood Mac producer said Lindsey Buckingham had a ‘my way or the highway’ attitude’ while recording ‘Tusk’
According to producer Ken Caillat, a replica of the guitarist’s bathroom wasn’t the only demand Lindsey Buckingham made. Caillat worked with Fleetwood Mac on several albums, including Rumours and Tusk.
He said that Buckingham became very controlling while making Rumours, and that behavior carried over into Tusk. For example, the guitarist made adjustments to the song “Second Hand News” while bassist John McVie was out of town.
“Originally, John McVie had an amazing, flowing and melodic bass part. Lindsey had a problem with that,” Caillat told MusicRadar in 2012. “It took him a while, but eventually, while John was on vacation, he put down his own bassline, one that was very simple, just quarter notes.”
Caillat admitted that Buckingham’s alterations improved the record, despite his domineering attitude. “It worked, though,” the producer said. “Lindsey had a grand plan in his head, and he got his way. This was the start of him really calling the shots. It became a ‘my way or the highway’ thing with him, which he perfected on the Tusk album.”
Christine McVie said she ‘didn’t really like’ the album
While Stevie Nicks said she thought Tusk was a great album, Fleetwood Mac keyboardist Christine McVie admitted the bandmates weren’t so sure of Lindsey Buckingham’s recording experiments.
“We didn’t really like [Tusk],” McVie told The Guardian in 2013. “We just kind of went [rolls her eyes] okaaay. Because it was so different from Rumours. Deliberately so.”
But the keyboardist ultimately grew to love the album. “In hindsight, I do like that record, but at the time me and Stevie would be like: ‘What the hell is he doing in the toilet playing an empty Kleenex box for a drum?’”
