speed charts © 2007 meanspeed.comOne of the most powerful song of the 1970s was LANDSLIDE by Fleetwood Mac. Above you will see speed charts which I created this morning. I used the basic method as described on http://meanspeed.com: I measured each beat of each measure in groups of four quarter notes. After averaging the nine trials, I crunched the numbers and created the graphs in a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet. The numbers I measured are available on request.
I measured:
beats played: 252
mean time=3 minutes, 10.05 seconds
meanspeed=79.8 beats per minute
meanspace=752 milliseconds per beat
meanemotion=loneliness
Ian Schneider
meanspeed.com
April 29, 2007In looking for intelligent blog posts on this song, I came across this:
"FLEETWOOD MAC "And if you don't love me now you'll never love me again..."
Best Fleetwood Mac site on the Net: www.cyberpenguin.net!
Class C
FLEETWOOD MAC 
Year Of Release: 1975
Record rating = 8
Overall rating = 11 A somewhat unsecure, but still fascinating debut album displaying flashes of genius; maybe it was just recorded a bit too quickly.
Best song: RHIANNON Track listing: 1) Monday Morning; 2) Warm Ways; 3) Blue Letter; 4) Rhiannon; 5) Over My Head; 6) Crystal; 7) Say You Love Me; 8) Landslide; 9) World Turning; 10) Sugar Daddy; 11) I'm So Afraid.
Yup, this is where songwriter/guitar player Lindsey Buckingham and his girlfriend/songwriter Stevie Nicks finally come on board, and Fleetwood Mac's miraculous transformation is completed. Christine McVie's contributions to the album are mostly in the same style as on the previous ones, but this is the only true link. No more dreamy Bob Welch 'serious' tunes: the band goes totally 'pop', with Buckingham's pop rockers complemented by Nicks' pop ballads. The few 'serious' fans that the band still had left have probably evaporated into thin air, but the band didn't care: with their first 'new' album, they have certainly secured themselves a thousand times as much fans as they had lost. Of course, in order to do that, both John McVie and Mick Fleetwood had to betray their blues roots, and I still can't understand the developments of the trusty rhythm section. Were they so desperate in their search of commercial success, or were they so fed up with blues and 'prog' tunes? You tell me, I won't even begin to guess.
Whatever be, the band was certainly aware of the fact that they were beginning an entirely new life. This is probably why the record is self-titled. Special note to all future (and present) artists:
NEVER make two records that share the same name. You don't really imagine to what extent this muddles up the discographies. The Hollies did the same thing with their 1964 and 1974 records, and it's disgusting, because you never know what album you or somebody else are speaking about. Apart from that,
Fleetwood Mac is a very good, somewhat innovative and obviously well-written, noteworthy album, but not without its flaws and a certain percent of filler. Personally, I feel it was recorded a bit too quickly after
Heroes (all the future Mac albums would take at least two years to be completed), and the band still hadn't had time to gel. The songwriting is more or less evenly split between Christine McVie, Buckingham and Nicks, and all of them are starting to near their peaks but not quite reaching them, except maybe for Nicks. This "pre-perfect" status, however, isn't explainable by any general faults or flaws - on the contrary, the general styles are well-established and flawless. It's within the individual compositions where the rub lies: I realize I'm being a little subjective here, since we're always on less trusty territory when dealing with individual songs, but hey, most of them are fab anyway, so why quibble when you can just agree with
my quibbles? Who's the reviewer on here, goddammit. Okay, enough ambitions - let me take them writer by writer and see all the pros and cons. First of all, our old friend Christine McVie is still in her
Heroes vibe, which means that most of her numbers are bland to the extreme, and I don't see any particular reason why they should be preferred to anything she put out earlier. Okay,
one reason - she is acquiring more and more skills as a melody-writer, and the arrival of Buckingham marks an obvious improvement of the production, which means that even if the melody doesn't work for you, the little arranging tricks will. What about that marvelous 'tee-da-dee-da-dee-da-dee-da-TING' crystal acoustic line that follows the opening lines of each verse in 'Over My Head'? Not to mention the song's unbelievable catchiness itself. 'Say You Love Me' rolls along freely and smoothly, although since I've become an addict of the 1997 live version, I kinda miss the faster tempo, the banjo and the backing 'ooh-la-la-la's of the band - still a great and perfectly flowing piece of work. Somewhat worse are Chris' two other contributions - 'Sugar Daddy' seems like a weaker imitation of 'Say You Love Me', maybe it has a wee bit more full-fledged arrangement, but the chorus seems to be forced and heading for a dead end instead of brilliantly resolving itself into something like "...sa-a-a-a-y that you love me". As for 'Warm Ways', that one's way too mellow for me, hell, whatever, Chris is almost predicting the basics of Nineties' adult contemporary. That 'forever, forever now' almost seems to be coming out of a romantic moment in
Santa Barbara. Duh. Nicks distinguishes herself even more than Chris. Come to think of it, it was her only chance - she was only accepted as a band member under the threat of Lindsey not joining at all. So she contributes the most memorable number - the mysterious ballad 'Rhiannon' which already displays all of Nicks' trademarks: mystical lyrics, slightly acid-tinged voice and a standard, but catchy pop melody (actually, the riff of the song is the best on this record - did Stevie really think about it herself? I bow down for her if yes). It's certainly good, though not as good as the similar 'Dreams' on
Rumours. Her other ballad, 'Landslide', is a beautiful piece of acoustic bliss - once I was so blind as not to notice the hooks, but hey, time heals all the wounds and all the silliness. But unfortunately (or fortunately - whatever, aren't we supposed to be talking objective here?), time hasn't changed my attitude to her third contribution, 'Crystal', which she donated to Lindsey to sing. I still can't understand why this is so often supposed to be a highlight. It has, like, one or two chords - just an ultra-slow, monotonous folkish acoustic shuffle with moody organ in the background. Gee. Fleetwood Mac were never an
atmospheric band: even if atmosphere was a necessary part of the charm of some of their numbers, mostly Stevie's ('Dreams', for instance, can't be enjoyed unless you dig in that atmosphere), they never managed to get out on atmosphere alone, always complementing it with memorable guitar lines or quirky catchy beats. No memorable guitar lines or quirky catchy beats here - so 'scuse me. Gotta admit it, though, the ending is pretty tasteful - I like the way Lindsey's acoustic swirls contrast with that organ. Even so, already at this point Lindsey is definitely the most self-assured and creative writer of the three. He manages to churn out a couple of punchy, danceable and truly enjoyable rockers, such as the opening 'Monday Morning' which sets a good tone for the entire record, and an obscure cover of an obscure outfit, the Curtis Brothers, called 'Blue Letter' that's become a stage favourite since then. The honour of closing the album goes to him as well, and he sure doesn't let the band down: 'I'm So Afraid' may not be truly outstanding in the melodical sense, but it gives the album a slightly darker and menacing edge: exactly the thing that was needed to compensate for McVie's sentimentalism. In concert, the song would become a real showstopper and an incredible showcase for Lindsey's guitar playing abilities, but hear me rave on that one later on. And on 'World Turning' (co-written and co-sung with Christine), Lindsey even gives a hint at his rock'n'roll abilities, engaging in a lengthy (but not overlong) rock jam with the rhythm section. In any case,
Fleetwood Mac, despite all my complaints, is still a first-rate pop album - not glossy perfection like
Rumours, of course, but then again, some prefer it that way. And the new version of Fleetwood Mac was
really eager to prove the world that it was yet early to lament the death of poppy melodicity.
"Labels: landslide
