Fleetwood Mac – Fleetwood Mac – Mofi Hybrid SACD

Sourced from the original analog master tapes and housed in mini-LP-style gatefold packaging, Mobile Fidelity’s numbered-edition hybrid SACD of the nine-times-platinum effort plays with stunning transparency, dynamics, and detail. This reissue captures what went down in the California studio with arresting presence and sumptuous tonality.

The innate chemistry among the five musicians can be heard here in stunning clarity, the taut albeit flexible rhythms distinguished with palpable grip, the blended vocals and airy harmonies benefitting from seemingly unlimited frequency extension. The thrilling results speak to the band’s bond as well as healthy tension that led to recordings that more than five decades later remain revered for their exceptional realism, openness, textures, imaging, and soundstaging. And that says nothing about the freshness of the songs themselves.

Six of those tunes were written or co-written by Buckingham or Nicks, who lent the band — reeling from the departure of guitarist Bob Welch — a diversity, soulfulness, and breadth it lacked in the past. Then again, the romantically involved partners weren’t exactly burning up the charts on their own. Their Buckingham Nicks LP was largely ignored upon release and found the twosome questioning their futures. But fate has a weird way of operating, and rather than recruiting another six-string blues virtuoso into the mix, Fleetwood Mac called an audible.

Prompted to visit Sound City Studios after telling someone in a grocery store he needed a place to record Fleetwood Mac’s tenth album, Fleetwood heard Buckingham Nicks played back by Olsen as a demonstration of the studio’s capabilities. Unable to forget what he heard, the drummer soon invited Buckingham to join his band. Displaying his now-famous reluctance to cede any creative control, Buckingham initially hedged before accepting on one condition: He and Nicks came as a package.

That agreement stands as one of the most significant career-altering moves any band ever made. Suffice it to say Nicks’ Plan B — “we can always quit,” she reasoned to Buckingham — stayed on the backburner. After rehearsing together for just ten days and sussing out potential roles, the new iteration of Fleetwood Mac entered Sound City in January 1975 and laid down the tracks for the showstopper Rolling Stone ranks as the 182nd Greatest Album of All Time.

In many ways, Fleetwood Mac got far more than they bargained for in taking on the American duo. Buckingham and Nicks arrived loaded for bear. “Monday Morning,” “Rhiannon,” and “I’m So Afraid” had already been workshopped and penciled in for a second Buckingham-Nicks record. “Crystal” was re-purposed and re-imagined after its original inclusion of Buckingham Nicks.

Nicks also brought another recently penned song to the sessions, a beautiful gem none other than “Landslide.” McVie later admitted that the quality of material triggered a competitive spirit within her and inspired her to take her own songwriting to another level. “Warm Ways,” “Say You Love Me,” and “Over My Head” underscore that determination. Ditto her collaboration with Buckingham on “World Turning.”

Constituting the old Fleetwood Mac in name only, Fleetwood Mac is the sound and style of an entirely new entity, a rebirth, and a reward for perseverance and a little bit of chance fortune. Above all, however, the album — which peaked at No. 1 on Billboardmore than a year after its street date — towers as a testament to then-novel combinations of hook-laden power pop, mystical folk, cool R&B, melodic rock ‘n’ roll and a wondrous balance of perfection and pragmatism, delicate and deliberate, mellow and maverick.

Indeed, from the ocean-swept breeziness of the opening “Monday Morning” through the optimistic vibes of the building “Over My Head” to the stacked structure of the closing “I’m So Afraid,” Fleetwood Mac contains not a single dull moment or wasted note. In short order, the band would attain even greater commercial success with the subsequent Rumours. Yet the restless energy, innovative spirit, breath-of-fresh-air newness, and across-the-board fantastic performances of Fleetwood Mac would never be surpassed.