Is Your Favorite Band Still Together?
It's a fantasy to believe they will; however, like that girl you shared everything with in high school, you can remember them fondly.
A few years ago the band Dawes released a song called, “All Your Favorite Bands.” It was a tender friendship song. Not quite a love song because the singer is more or less reminiscing over a friend of the opposite sex, but the yearning remains unfulfilled. The platonic connection is evident in the lyrics and so is the iconic sentiment of the song’s last lines, “I hope the world sees the same person that you always were to me/And may all your favorite bands stay together.” Well, my friends, it’s a heartfelt wish, but like unicorns and world championships for the home team, it tends to be wishful thinking.
Bands fall apart all the time, sometimes even before they become a band (Google Denver’s Churchill). Most of the time it’s ugly. Take the current he said, she said of the Fleetwood Mac drama. Ok, that’s a sentence rock critics have written many times (“Take the recent Fleetwood Mac drama”). Lindsey Buckingham claims he and Stevie Nicks were fired from the band by Mick Fleetwood. Nicks, his former lover, and partner on one of the greatest soft rock albums of all time, Buckingham Nicks has chosen the high road on this one. In response to the fracas, the band ‘reunited’ for a massive tour and replaced Buckingham with not one, but two stellar musicians. In a nod to just how good Buckingham is, the Mac had to get former Crowded House singer Neil Finn to sing Buckingham’s parts and rock god guitarist Mike Campbell from Tom Petty’s Heartbreakers to play the brilliant guitar parts.
Musically, I am sure those shows were ridiculously good. With two proven professionals to replace one and the recent recordings by Nicks and harmonist, Christine McVie has proven the seventy-plus-year-olds can still hold a tune. The question us snobs like to ask though “is it Fleetwood Mac?” Granted the early years of the band didn’t include Buckingham nor Nicks for that matter. In fact, Buckingham’s predecessor was a singer-songwriter named Bob Welch.
Then there was the case of The FAKE Fleetwood Mac. Back in 1974, the band’s manager Clifford Davis decided he owned the name. In spite of the fact that the two band’s namesakes (Mick Fleetwood and John McVie) were not in the group, a Fleetwood Mac toured. The disastrous troupe ended shortly after it started and the band members went on to minimal work as members of Deep Purple and Alan Parsons Project. The ensuing court battle left the name and the band in limbo for well over a year. Then, there was a ten-year run with Welch, Fleetwood, and the McVies making up the core of the band. Welch went solo and then Fleetwood heard that aforementioned record, Buckingham Nicks, and soft FM radio had its hits for a lifetime.
So is there ever really a true band, forever? Of course, Rush and The Tragically Hip make a strong case-must be a Canadien thing. Even they have now fallen victim to age as both bands have ceased to exist (for now) with the deaths of a key member. It doesn’t have to be that way. If they are your favorite band then they always should be. However, don’t wallow. Find the joy that Dawes did in their imaginary relationship. Seek live music as a flash memory of what once was. Go watch a tribute band since it's the music you enjoy. When Gretzky was traded to Los Angeles, Edmonton fans didn’t give up on their team.
Dead and Company has proven that the merit of musicianship and playing the songs you love with as close rendition as possible to original lineup is what counts (right Lynyrd Skynyrd?). So did your favorite band stay together? That’s a question only you can answer, and for you, I hope it did. For the rest of us, we can listen to the same music and still hopefully hear what my favorite band was to me.
