Lindsey Buckingham – “Gift of Screws” (2008)
This review of LB’s recent album comes from Nic Oliver from the musicOMH website (Sept. 15th)…
Lindsey Buckingham is that increasingly rare beast in the pop world; an ageing rocker who still counts. For a man who has made indescribably large amounts of money with Fleetwood Mac, and who is the author of some of the finest soft rock songs of all time, it is refreshing to find him nearing his sixties and still releasing solo albums that stand up against his late ’70s peak.
The follow-up to 2006’s largely acoustic Under the Skin, a fine album in its own right, Gift of Screws takes its title (an Emily Dickinson reference) and several tracks from an abortive late ’90s session. Other tracks from those sessions cropped up on the Fleetwood Mac reunion album Say You Will, a 2003 release that indicated that Buckingham had relocated the songwriting genie that went temporarily absent during the previous decade.
Gift of Screws is a thrilling album from the very first track. “Great Day” positively bursts out of the speakers with its aggressive acoustic guitar and daring vocal lines. “Time Precious Time” is even better, with rippling guitar arpeggios and a heavy echo treatment on the vocal (a common Buckingham production trick). This is challenging, thought-provoking music that you would expect from a younger artist.
Then again, this is the reclusive studio genius that unleashed the decidedly odd Tusk on the world at the height of Fleetwood Mac’s fame. Buckingham is a devil for injecting quirky elements into his glossy soft rock confections, but in such a subtle way that his efforts are routinely overlooked (he opened his previous album with the line “Reading the paper saw a review/Said I was a visionary, but nobody knew”).
Buckingham’s regular band serves him well throughout the album, although Fleetwood Mac bandmates Mick Fleetwood and John McVie also pop up on several tracks. The duo lends a healthy commercial swagger to “Love Runs Deeper” and “The Right Place to Fade.” The latter track is terrific, the stacked harmonies and killer riff sounding like they could have been lifted straight from a Rumours session.
The dependable rhythm section also guest on the title track, a crazed rocker that features Buckingham yelping like a man possessed. It sounds like a companion piece to some of the more outré moments from Tusk, notably “Not That Funny” and “That’s Enough for Me.”
Although this album is marketed as a return to a more direct rock sound Buckingham is far too smart an operator to sacrifice substance for style. “Did You Miss Me” is a whip-smart pop single good enough to already have landed on the US charts, and boasts one of the album’s most direct lyrical pleas for connection and understanding. The contemplative lyrics of “Bel Air Rain” and “Treason,” meanwhile, are given added weight by strong melodies and delicately layered arrangements.
Written and recorded over a lengthy period, Gift of Screws could have been a mess. Instead, it is a glorious statement of intent from one of pop’s most misunderstood characters.
Nic Oliver
Lindsey Buckingham – “Go Insane” (1984)
Christopher Connelly’s review of Go Insane from the Aug. 30, 1984 issue of Rolling Stone…
Lindsey Buckingham’s Tuneful Triumph
Fleetwood Mac’s Guitarist Sounds Like an Eighties Version of Brian Wilson
Buckingham’s strongest influence has always been Brian Wilson, the out-there but studio-savvy Beach Boy with an impeccable pop ear. Yet while Wilson’s music speaks with an airy, wouldn’t-it-be-nice optimism, Buckingham’s work reveals a slightly warped obsessiveness. He uses music the way Talking Heads’ David Byrne uses words: taking simple, even clichéd, constructions and tossing them together in unexpected combinations.
That potent, brainy mixture is further invigorated on Go Insane by a dollop of seething sexual passion. ”I guess I had to prove I was someone hard to lose,” Buckingham chants before kicking into the dazzling, “I Want You,” perhaps his most nakedly emotional song to date. A gleeful keyboard hook explodes into an aural torrent: synthesizers, guitars and drums rage, as Buckingham furiously cries out his heart’s dichotomy: “I’m a bundle of joy, a pocketful of tears/Got enough of both to last all the years.”
Lyrically, Go Insane limns a painful breakup: “Hey little girl, leave the little drug alone,” he pleads in “I Must Go,” and similar strains of dark-etched longing appear throughout the record. But Buckingham’s words – although they are intriguingly unsettling – take a back seat to the parade of toe-tapping sound here. Even though he plays almost every instrument on the album, Buckingham avoids the cluttered, too-perfect sheen often associated with West Coast music. The rough edges are still there, and the overall sound has lightness that enhances the record’s emotional impact.
On that score, “Bang the Drum” is Go Insane’s finest achievement. Its ticktock, ethereally intoned verse drifts off into a gloriously cascading chorus and a bridge that’s thick with ear-pleasing harmonies, with a stinging guitar solo to boot. More of Buckingham’s axe work is on display in the uptempo “Loving Cup,” which fuses the snaky lines of “Gold Dust Woman” with the spare, threatening whomp of Tusk’s undiscovered treasure, “Not That Funny.”
Even the more commercially minded songs are infused with Buckingham’s newfound boldness. While his first solo album, Law and Order, featured the mild-mannered “Trouble,” Go Insane offers the Mark Lindsay-ish title song, all hard edges and pungent longing (“I call your name/She’s a lot like you”). Similarly, a whipcrack backbeat kicks “Slow Dancing” out of the living room and onto the dance floor where it belongs. Admittedly, the found-sound antics of the two-part “Play in the Rain” (glasses of water being poured, heels clip-clopping across a sidewalk) pale after a couple of listenings, though Buckingham’s sitarlike fretboard runs add some excitement. But then there’s “D.W. Suite,” a three-part valediction to the late Dennis Wilson in which Buckingham really pulls out the stops: Laurie Anderson-style vocal effects, a harp interlude, a synthesized Ed Sullivan introduction, a Beach Boys-type chorus and a Scottish flute march. ”D.W. Suite” may be pop’s most elaborate farewell, but its flashy eclecticism is reined in throughout by Buckingham’s keen rock & roll sense.
Artistically, Go Insane is a breakthrough album not just for the thirty-six-year-old Buckingham, but conceivably for rock & roll as well, representing as it does the most successful combination yet of hummable Seventies slick rock and Eighties avant-edge. If Lindsey Buckingham really is following in the footsteps of his idol, then Go Insane is his Pet Sounds: possibly his least commercial work, but also his most daring and savory.
Christopher Connelly
Lindsey Buckingham – “Shuffle Riff” (Demo – 2001)
This is from the original Gift of Screws album from 2001, that was never released. It is not to be on the upcoming album of the same name.
Lindsey Buckingham – “Out of the Cradle” (1992)
Written Aug. 15, 2008…
After Lindsey Buckingham left Fleetwood Mac (at the time, what seemed like for good), he started recording his third solo album. Five long years later he finally emerged from his private domain and released Out of the Cradle. It was a return to simpler arrangements and tighter song structures (somewhat in the manner of Rumours), after the insular, paranoid brilliance of Tusk and Go Insane and the skewed pop of Tango in the Night. This was probably his best all-round album ever, in terms of actual songs and should have been a big seller for him. Unfortunately, it didn’t set the charts on fire but it was my favorite album of 1992. I remember though, being slightly disappointed at the time, because of it not being as adventurous as Go Insane. We had become used to expecting Buckingham to play the eccentric and idiosyncratic pop savant. Out of the Cradle seemed almost too normal for him. But that is probably why these songs have aged so well. It was filled with excellent songwriting and performing. And sometimes that is enough. This is a man who clearly knows his craft.
The album starts off with some of Lindsey’s brilliant acoustic fingerpicking, before quickly segueing into “Don’t Look Down,” which he sings beautifully (quietly on the verses, more forcefully in the chorus). Next up is “Wrong,” which appears to be an angry response to Mick Fleetwood’s autobiography and some of the sordid events Mick wrote about Lindsey’s departure from Fleetwood Mac in 1987. It doesn’t sound like Lindsey agreed with Mick on many of the details.
“Countdown” is one of Lindsey’s greatest songs. Pure pop perfection. This should have been a huge hit for him and might have been if only Fleetwood Mac’s name had been on it. Unfortunately, Buckingham, even though he is considered the genius of Fleetwood Mac, is only the third biggest hit maker in the band. Stevie Nicks and Christine McVie were the ones that had the majority of hits, though Buckingham did manage to have three of his songs become major mainstays on pop radio. He has had a difficult time making a name for himself outside of the band, unlike Stevie, whose solo albums sold in the millions.
“Doing What I Can” sounds like it may have been an outtake from Tango in the Night. It has a similar sound to songs like “Family Man” and “Big Love.”
“All My Sorrow” is a beautiful, haunting song. Lindsey’s double-tracked vocal is magnificent, with a shimmering musical background. It’s followed by “Soul Drifter,” another wonderful pop confection. The breezy, effervescent “You Do or You Don’t” is one of the catchier songs on the album and another should-have-been hit.
There is much more guitar playing throughout, then we are used to hearing from Buckingham. Many exquisite acoustic interludes, as well as stinging electric solos, especially on “This is the Time.”
“Surrender the Rain” starts off with a whispered spoken introduction about obsession and fear, before leading into another gem of a song. The keyboard that starts things off also sounds like another holdover from Tango in the Night.
“Say We’ll Meet Again” is a lovely, simple ending to the album. Sounds like it could have come out in the late 50s or early 60s.
For some reason, this was the last full album from Lindsey until 2003’s Fleetwood Mac reunion album Say You Will. He was working on a fourth studio album for many years, before some of those songs got used on Say You Will. He is a man that will not be rushed in the studio. But when he comes out with albums this good, it is definitely worth the wait.
Jay Mucci
Lindsey Buckingham – “Go Insane” (1984)
Written Aug. 15, 2008…
Buckingham was just coming off an intense six year relationship with then-live-in girlfriend Carol Ann Harris when he wrote and recorded Go Insane and this album reflects the heartbreak and conflicted feelings he was experiencing. Songs of disappointment, obsession, sadness, anger and loneliness. But for the most part, the lyrics are minimal. Buckingham has always had a knack for conveying an emotion in as few words as possible. But lyrics have never been his strong suit. It’s his music, melodies and sonic wizardry that are the reason he is sometimes referred to as the successor to Brian Wilson. Not that he sounds like Wilson per se – but he clearly inherited his sense of experimentation. He’s never been afraid to push the limits of what a “pop” song can be, just as Wilson was doing with “Good Vibrations” and Smile. Buckingham proved that to great effect on Fleetwood Mac’s most adventurous album Tusk and he continues that sense of exploring here.
This album in a lot of ways is almost like an art project. He performs almost all of the instruments and sings all the vocals. It does have a certain fussy, studio-based sound to it. But Lindsey is such a master of the studio, that he turns what could have been an insulated, self-indulgent mess into pure brilliance. He has a love for finding odd sounds and using strange production techniques (crashing sounds, sped-up vocals, falling water) and turning them into hooks. His most adventurous songs never go the way you expect them to. They may start off normally and then abruptly go off in some unexpected direction. Sometimes they may start off bizarrely and then quickly turn into the most commercial sounding melody you can imagine. You simply never know. And I think this album was the pinnacle of that experimental phase of his career.
Every song is great in its own way but this is clearly an album that should be heard in its entirety, like Dark Side of the Moon or Sgt. Pepper. These in some ways are not really individual “songs” but more like pieces in a bigger puzzle. If you take one of the pieces out, the picture loses something in the process. Still, certain songs stick out, such as the title track – one of his most underrated songs. He resurrected it many years later in concert, doing a slow acoustic version of it. This has the best arrangement though.
The relentlessly intense “I Must Go” is another clear winner – he sounds tortured and angry, yet the song still comes off catchy as hell. Album opener “I Want You,” starts off strangely, before shifting into a catchy, hard-rocking number with a slight Brian Wilson influence and some great guitar playing.
“Play in the Rain” is a two-part experimental piece with strange sound effects that starts off quietly with Lindsey intoning “Oh, I was lonely/Oh, can we play in the rain?” several times. Then before you know it, you are in the middle of some bazaar in Bombay with a sitar playing. Then it strangely fades away and fades back in, sounding like it did at the beginning. Then he lets loose some intense guitar playing and keeps asking “can we play in the rain?” Who knows what it all means? It shouldn’t work yet for some reason it does.
“D.W. Suite” is a tribute to Dennis Wilson, who had recently passed away. The song goes through many changes, starting off quietly with echoing backing vocals, briefly shifting into some spacier sections, then some 1950’s-styled gospel refrains and ending up as an Irish folk melody that speeds up until the whole thing comes to a sudden halt. The suite is not about Dennis Wilson but it does reflect some of his expansive approach to music-making as well as Brian Wilson’s of course.
The album is forever hard to pin down. It has many styles: 1960s pop music, 1980s New Wave, fractured funk, jagged art rock, not to mention his ever-present folk-rock melodic sense. It’s all in there. It’s what Buckingham does with it all that makes this his slightly-flawed but ultimately brilliant masterpiece.
Jay Mucci
Lindsey Buckingham – “Miranda” (Demo – 2001)
Same as “Say Goodbye” below….originally to be on the first version of Gift of Screws, later recorded for Fleetwood Mac’s Say You Will.
Lindsey Buckingham – “Say Goodbye” (Demo – 2001)
This is from the original version of Gift of Screws from 2001, that was never released. It was later fleshed out by Fleetwood Mac (including Stevie Nicks’ backing vocals) and released on their 2003 reunion album Say You Will.
Lindsey Buckingham – “Did You Miss Me” (2008)
Lindsey’s brand new single from his upcoming album Gift of Screws.
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Lindsey Buckingham – “Gift of Screws” (2008)
The brand new title track from Fleetwood Mac’s genius singer/songwriter & guitarist from his upcoming album. Definitely a different sound for him – much more rocking than we are used to hearing from Lindsey.
(Note this is audio only)
