Stevie Nicks/Fleetwood Mac – Think About It from Agusia D. on Vimeo.

Turns out something good did come out of my strep throat after all. Long after I can eat something other than Frozen Yogourt, I’ll remember this song, and the enduring message;

Take on the situation but not the torment
Now you know it’s not as bad as it seems…

Stevie’s voice isn’t the same as it was when she recorded the first version of this song 30 years ago, of course. In many ways, it’s better. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again; I really respect her for not trying to sing it the way she did back then. She tailors all her songs to her present vocal range -which is lower, but also much more textured and rich- doesn’t try to hit notes she can’t, and sounds really soulful and smooth as a result. She also has a deeper quality to her singing, as though she now understands the lyrics she herself penned decades past. As a result, songs like Rhiannon and Landslide are revisited with a soulful knowing maturity that is as emotionally evocative as it is beautiful.

Here’s the clip of Stevie and Sheryl performing on the April 13, 2011 edition of the Oprah Winfrey show:

Christine has a quiet dignity while accompanying herself on the piano, but it is Nicks and Buckingham who take the show’s reigns. Stevie belts out classics like Gypsy, Gold Dust Woman and Rhiannon with a voice that is more rich and beautiful than ever. For his part, Buckingham has a show stopping solo in the middle of the concert, playing Big Love and Go Insane with raw intensity.

They wrap their voices around each other in ballads like the McVie compositions Say You Love Me and Don’t Stop. More spectacular is the fact that each singer has the benefit of having two multi-talented others singing backup on their solo compositions. Nicks does backing vocals on Christine’s You Make Loving Fun, and Christine returns the favor on Nicks’ Rhiannon. Lindsay’s Bleed to Love Her is given added texture and depth when both women chime in to back him during the chorus. Perhaps the most beautiful collaboration comes when Lindsay’s guitar softly accompanies Stevie’s vocals on Landslide. As he strings away, and her rich grainy voice belts out the lyrics, “time makes you bolder, children get older, and I’m getting older too,” Nicks smiles, indicating that the words ring more truthfully today than when she originally wrote them.

Time has indeed made Fleetwood Mac older and wiser. The cohesive unit that exchanges smiles and knowing glances across the stage was always prolific, but not always a happy unit. The group has gone through many incarnations as a band. The only constants from the start have been the band’s British namesake rhythm section, composed of bass player John McVie and drummer Mick Fleetwood. The band originated as a blues outfit in the United Kingdom, with front man Peter Green. The late sixties saw the addition of John’s girlfriend, singer and songwriter Christine Perfect. After her marriage to John, she took the name McVie, and continued to use it even after the couple divorced years later. In the early seventies, after Green’s departure, Fleetwood traveled to California to scout recording locations for the band. A sound engineer played him a recording by a little known duo; Buckingham Nicks. Fleetwood passed on the recording studio, but loved the musicians he’d heard on the demo tape. He contacted the young Americans, Lindsay Buckingham and his girlfriend Stevie Nicks and invited them to join the fledgling band.

In 1974, the retooled Fleetwood Mac released their self-titled album to enormous praise. Unfortunately, their success was matched by mounting internal turmoil. John and Christine began divorce proceedings, Lindsay and Stevie ended their love affair, and Mick Fleetwood found his wife Lynn having an affair. The inner turmoil manifested itself into the autobiographical and stunning Rumors album in 1977. Though they continued to tour and record as a band, their personal relationships had begun to splinter, and by the mid eighties, Nicks and Buckingham had left Fleetwood Mac. Though the band continued to tour and record into the early nineties with replacement singers, without Buckingham and Nicks the chemistry and success seemed to have faded.

When the classic Fleetwood Mac lineup resurfaced, it was, of all places, at Bill Clinton’s inauguration in 1993. A fan since the band’s early days, Clinton chose Don’t Stop as his campaign anthem. When he was elected president, he invited all five members of the classic lineup to perform at his inauguration. They each agreed, and the concert was such a success that the band reunited. Enough time had passed that old wounds were gone, mid-twenties egos quelled, and the collaboration began anew. By 1997, the band had begun touring and recording together again. The culmination of this rebirth came in the form of The Dance, which documents a live Fleetwood Mac concert.

The tension that drove Buckingham and Nicks on stage in the early years had evolved into a respectful collaboration. Director Bruce Gower does a beautiful job showcasing the music, as well as each band member’s personality with the Dance DVD. He spends little time focusing on the audience, and instead hones in on each artist, picking up even the smallest gestures between Nicks and Buckingham.

For their part, the artists seem able to cover old standards which were written during their painful breakup with every bit as much passion as they did when they first composed the material. When Nicks sings her breakup anthem Silver Springs and repeatedly chants “you’ll never get away from the sound of the woman that loves you” while staring into Buckingham’s eyes, it is eerily apparent that the prophecy made during their breakup thirty years ago has become reality. The viewer is swept into the musical journey, made all the more poignant by the fact that the performers actually lived it. There are times when it seems almost unreal that these people could endure singing these deeply emotional songs- written about each other, directly to the person for whom the song was written. But in an instant, Nicks and Buckingham flash a smile across the stage to each other, and reassure the audience in the process, that this is history, and that the future looks far brighter. After Buckingham’s guitar sweetly and perfectly accompanies Nick’s vocals on Landslide, they thank each other, and embrace.

In a delightful surprise, the band invited the University of Southern California Marching Band to join them on stage for Tusk and Don’t Stop, and the result is both musically and visually uproarious.

Christine McVie, often overshadowed by the sometimes larger than life Buckingham and Nicks, is a constant and often underestimated force in the band. It is she who composed the Fleetwood Mac anthem, Don’t Stop, and her solo piano performance on the lyrical and beautiful Songbird closed every Fleetwood Mac concert for over thirty years.

The artistry of Fleetwood Mac proves as in tact as ever. While Stevie Nicks revisits some of her classic songs, she does not try to perform the way she did when she was in her mid twenties: She modifies her music to adapt to her changing vocal range, which has become more textured with age. The result – most notably on Rhiannon and Landslide- is magnificent.

Whether one is a classic Fleetwood Mac Fan or a music patron looking to broaden horizons, this DVD is a must see.