![\"Stevie](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/Stevie-Nicks-2014-Far-Out-Magazine-F-1140x855.jpg\")
<\/p>\n <\/p>\n
(Credits: Far Out \/ YouTube Still)<\/p>\n
Sun 7 December 2025 18:30, UK <\/p>\n
While there is no doubting that Stevie Nicks<\/a> has the capacity to rattle the rafters like a flatpack wardrobe on faultline, she also has the uncanny knack of making the spotlight at Madison Square Garden look like a flickering candle.<\/p>\n That \u2018private performance\u2019 sensibility takes great control and vulnerability. The latter is very hard to exhibit in a group like Fleetwood Mac. Over the years, the band has certainly proven itself to be far from a daycare centre for wandering musicians. In fact, there have been so many callous casualties that some have questioned whether it is cursed, and the straighter-laced concerns have questioned its working practices.<\/p>\n Danny Kirwan, for instance, was shaping up to be one of the finest guitarists of his generation when he was at the helm of the Mac, but he ultimately ended up homeless and destitute. You can read a lot into how Mick Fleetwood addressed the matter: \u201cDanny had been a nervous and sensitive lad<\/a> from the start. He was never really suited to the rigours of the business,\u201d the drummer once opined.<\/p>\n Elucidating the problem by adding, \u201cTouring is hard, and the routine wears us all down \u2026 Our manager kept us touring non-stop, and we were being stretched to our limits \u2026 and the pressure was obviously taking its toll. He simply withdrew into his own world.\u201d <\/p>\n This brutal regime brought a ruthlessness to the group, and nobody knows that more than Bekka Bramlett. The singer, who had previously worked with the likes of Faith Hill, Joe Cocker, and Vince Gill as a backing vocalist, somewhat came to the Mac\u2019s rescue ahead of their 1995 album Time, and the tours either side of it. <\/p>\n At that point, the group were without Stevie Nicks, Christine McVie, and Lindsey Buckingham, but a defiant Mick Fleetwood heard some of Bramlett\u2019s session work and thought she was a great fit. The pair had worked together as part of the drummer\u2019s Zoo side project, and he sensed a musical chemistry.<\/p>\n Nevertheless, there was an asterisk over her position. Nicks had grown exhausted in the group, and the continued bickering over the inclusion or lack thereof of \u2018Silver Springs\u2019 on the Rumours box set had meant that she acrimoniously parted ways to focus on her solo career. At the same junction, McVie refused to go out on tour. So, the band was in disarray, and Bramlett was almost a Hail Mary to save it, more so than a simple substitute.<\/p>\n \u201cI knew my job was to get Stevie back,\u201c Bramlett said. \u201cI wasn\u2019t a moron. I also knew this was a dangerous job when I took it. I knew I was facing tomatoes. But I didn\u2019t want to wear a top hat. I didn\u2019t want to twirl around. I wanted to be me. I even dyed my hair brown just so people in the cheap seats would know that Stevie wasn\u2019t going to be here. I didn\u2019t want anyone to be discouraged or let down\u201d.<\/p>\n However, Nicks would later point out that there was another way the crowd could tell she wasn\u2019t quite the real McCoy (at least in Stevie\u2019s vested book). In a frosty confrontation following a string of Bramlett-fronted shows with the band, the session singer recalled bumping into Nicks and being addressed as an absent pronoun.\u201dThe first thing she said was, \u2018Oh, I didn\u2019t know she was blonde. And she oversings\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n While Bramlett didn\u2019t begrudge the \u2018Dreams\u2019 songwriter, it seems this scathing critique did affect her. \u201cEveryone at the table said the same thing,\u201d she told Rolling Stone, \u201cso I know it\u2019s true. But it\u2019s OK. I still love her. She probably felt like I pissed on her tree. I can understand that.\u201d<\/p>\n However, it was the actual members of Fleetwood Mac at the time that she had more cause to be concerned with. \u201cI felt broken,\u201d Bramlett said of her departure. \u201cWhat you have to understand is that Mick and I were the guys that did all the radio and promotion and TV stuff. We did all of it. I was definitely looking forward to the tour we had already just promoted. Evidently, someone said, \u2018Get her out of here\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n And they did \u2018get her out\u2019 in the most brutal of fashions: Mick Fleetwood fired her via fax. That\u2019s like your wife leaving you over email. And that fax was far from heartwarming either. While on tour, Bramlett had joked that she would have rather joined another of her favourite groups, and the quip came back to bite her.<\/p>\n Mick\u2019s fax read: \u201cYou wish you were in REO Speedwagon [instead], so I\u2019m going to go ahead and fire you now.\u201d Alas, you suspect it is the cold \u201coversings\u201d comment that remains unretracted that still stings the most. If it\u2019s any consolation to Bramlett, David Crosby near-enough accused Nicks<\/a> of the same flaw, and he was her hero, too.<\/p>\n Thankfully, unlike some of Fleetwood Mac\u2019s fallen members, Bramlett would continue to have a busy career as a session singer, member of Bekka & Billy, and seemingly happily retreated to the quieter, safer side of the business, which, in all honesty, is pretty much anywhere but the Mac. <\/p>\n<\/p>\n Related Topics<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"(Credits: Far Out \/ YouTube Still) Sun 7 December 2025 18:30, UK While there is no doubting that…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":331638,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[49,48,75,2009,341,2012],"class_list":{"0":"post-331637","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-music","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-entertainment","11":"tag-fleetwood-mac","12":"tag-music","13":"tag-stevie-nicks"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/331637","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=331637"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/331637\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/331638"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=331637"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=331637"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=331637"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Bekka](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/Bekka-Bramlett-Singer-The-Zoo-1992-Far-Out-Magazine-1024x768.jpg\")
<\/a>Bekka Bramlett performing with Fleetwood Mac. (Credits: Far Out \/ YouTube Still)<\/p>\n