(C) Daily Kos This story was originally published by Daily Kos and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . Morning Open Thread, Tuesday May 12th. Greatest Album ever? Rumours. [1] ['View Profile', 'Chitown Kev', 'Belinda Ridgewood', 'Chloris Creator', 'Bill In Portland Maine'] Date: 2026-05-12 Good Morning All! Welcome to the Morning Open Thread, a daily post with a MOTley crew of hosts.. Grab yourself a seat and vent. kibitz. ruminate. ramble. discuss. disagree. pontificate. Or just say hello. Its a open thread . Talk about whatever you’d like. The MOTley Schedule Sunday: Ice Blue Monday: officebss Tuesday: RandomNeuron <<<<<<<< TUESDAY! Wednesday: youffraita Thursday: Ozarkblue Friday: officebss Saturday: Ozarkblue A Random Neuron I’ve exhausted my supply of random cool pictures of neurons so i’m going academic. Courtesy of Michigan State and their very clear Foundations of Neuroscience material. Todays bit: Cell Body The cell body, shown here in green and also known as the soma, contains the nucleus and cellular organelles, including endoplasmic reticulum, Golgi apparatus, mitochondria, ribosomes, and secretory vesicles. The nucleus houses the DNA of the cell, which is the template for all proteins synthesized in the cell. The organelles, illustrated in the inset box, in the soma are responsible for cellular mechanisms like protein synthesis, packaging of molecules, and cellular respiration. Figure 1.3. Neuronal cell body organelles. The soma contains the nucleus and organelles essential for cellular function, including mitochondria for energy production, endoplasmic reticulum for protein synthesis, and Golgi apparatus for protein processing and packaging. ‘Neuron Cell Body’ by Casey L. Henley (CC-BY-NC-SA). View detailed alternative text. We got rules here: I’m actually not making that the rule. good advice though. Todays Rule: Nice, that is it. Be Nice. (Grumpy is OK. It happens) Friends, if you have been reading my MOTs you may recall i enjoy some niche bands. Tool. All Them Witches. King Gizard and the Wizard Lizard. Portis Head. Massive Attack. and i’ve been know to overdose on Rage Against The Machine, System of a Down, and Rush, between splashes of the Talking Heads, the Clash, U2 and LCD Sound System. So what would i choose, if asked, for a favorite album? Some obscure masterpiece no doubt. Nope. Rumours. By Fleetwood Mac. Period. Fleetwood Mac – Full Album I was pleasantly surprised to see Rolling Stone has it as their 7th best. …. The band’s two couples — bassist John McVie and singer-keyboard player Christine McVie, who were married; guitarist Lindsey Buckingham and vocalist Stevie Nicks, who were not — broke up during the protracted sessions for the album. As John later told Rolling Stone of the atmosphere during the making of Rumours, “Parties going on all over the house. Amazing. Terrifying. Huge amounts of illicit materials, yards and yards of this wretched stuff. Days and nights would just go on and on.” This frenzied, decadent vibe lent a highly charged, confessional aura to such songs as Buckingham’s “Go Your Own Way,” Nicks’ “Dreams,” Christine’s “Don’t Stop,” and the group-composed anthem to betrayal, “The Chain.” The band’s soap opera fueled its own intricate creative conversation… Mind you – i make no claim it should be your greatest album or the greatest album. but its mine and i doubt anything will knock it from its slot. Theme? What is your favorite Album ? I figure if its your fave it deserves to be considered as the greatest ! Backstory? you want backstory? I love understanding how bands come together, marvel at how often the most mundane occurrences result in amazing art. In the case of the album Rumours itself there is the emotional angst going on between members of the band who were breaking up and reforming relationships during the recording. Those real stories fed sensationalist press … and all of it occurred in what it everyone involved agrees was a unhealthy sea of illicit drugs and non stop partying. There is a much longer story though. I’ll try to bring you from the bands inception to the Album Rumours. Full disclosure – i never realized what a convoluted story this was! I’ve used wiki extensively and as i finish up writing there are a few conflicting facts regarding dates and what not. i think the story is essentially correct though. if your a Fan feel free to correct me! Fleetwood Mac was formed in 1967 by Peter Green. Green had played in several bands – including John Mayall and the Bluesbreakers when he replaced Eric Clapton. When he left the Bluesbreakers he took with him their drummer, MIck Fleetwood and shortly after their bassist John McVie. Jeremy Spencer rounded out the group which was intended to be a blues band. Although they initially were a blues cover band Green proved to be a song writer as well an excellent guitarist. Among the songs he wrote was Black Magic Woman later covered famously by Santana. Here he is performing it in Boston. It was not to last. Green began to experiment with LSD and after a trip to Germany in which he consumed “bad” LSD he left the band . It was 1970 His mental health continued to decline, eventually his being diagnosed with schizophrenia and being committed to hospitals during the mid 70’s. At this point the band consisted of of the origonal members (minus Green) and Danny Kirwan who had previously been recruited to the band. During the recording of their next album Christine McVie, John McVie’s wife, performed both keyboards and vocals, albeit uncredited. She officially joined the band while they were touring the US in 1970. During this U.S. tour Spencer literally stepped out to “get a magazine” and never returned to the band. He was found several days later having joined a cult. (he remained a member and disputes that it is a cult or that he was coerced to join). It was 197 1 and once again the Band needed a new member. This time they recruited Bob Welch. With his addition the bands sound began to change – focusing on vocals and a more melodic rock sound. The next change came in 1972 as Kirwan, increasingly abusing alcohol while on tour, was fired due to conflicts within the band and his smashing his guitar prior to a show forcing them to play the gig without him. For the next album and tour Bob Weston (guitars) and Dave Walker (vocals), were added. At the end of the tour Walker was let go as not being a good fit for the band. In 1973 the remaining band embarked on their next album – their 8th. Attribution: Fair Use https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Mysteryband2.jpg Fleetwood Mac in 1973 with Christine McVie, Mick Fleetwood, Bob Weston, John McVie and Bob Welch. During this time the turmoil in the band intensified. The Mcvies Marriage was in trouble, with John’s alcohol abuse and their working together creating stress. Worse, Fleetwood discovered that Weston was having an affair with with his wife, Jenny Boyd. The band immediately fired Weston, canceling the tour. At this point the bands manager claimed to own the name and recruited an entire new band attempting to complete the tour. Suffice it to say this created enormous confusion including the record label refusing to recognize who the real band was. Welch decided to stay in LA while working with lawyers representing the real band. After major promoters vouched as to who the actual band was the label agreed to work with them again. Having determined they were being neglected by the label, Welch convinced the rest of the band to move to the US to improve their relationship with them and record the next album. It was 1974 when they completed that album and after the tour to support it Welch said: “the buzz that the Mystery to Me band had started to create…[was] gone. I [was] totally exhausted by writing, singing, touring, negotiating, moving, and frankly so [were] Mick, John and Chris. We were all discouraged that Heroes [hadn’t] done better. Something needs to change, but what? … There was also a kind of fatigue, anger and bitterness that all the work we had done hadn’t really paid off and we were just all sort of shaking our heads saying ‘what do we do now’ … Everybody knew that we had to find some new creative juice.”[69] Welch himself had grown tired of the constant struggles to keep Fleetwood Mac functioning and was openly considering leaving the band.[70] Buckingham/Nicks Its time for a detour…. Lindsay Buckingham and Stevie Nicks had met in high school and, well, i’ll let Nicks tell the story: I met Lindsey when I was a senior in high school and he was a junior, and we sang a song together at some after-school function. Two years later, in 1968, he called me and asked me if I wanted to be in a rock & roll band. I had been playing guitar and singing pretty much totally folk-oriented stuff. So I joined the band, and within a couple of weeks we were opening for really big shows: Jefferson Airplane, Janis Joplin. All of a sudden I was in rock & roll.[17] At this point the two of them were a couple, were actually seasoned live performers and set their sights on a recording contract. They were successful, recording their only album together, Buckingham Nicks in Sound City Studios. Somehow i ended up owning that album, which is odd because it was not a commercial success and not widely available. (much much later it was reissued). I actually thought it was great album. But i digress. Back to Fleetwood Mac As you may recall the band is burnt out. Tired. Unhappy that the effort is not resulting in the level of success they hope for. Mick Fleetwood goes shopping for a new Studio to use and visits Sound City Studios. Sound familiar? And the sound engineer plays him a Buckingham Nicks recording. And Buckingham is actually in studio that day . And Fleetwood offers him a place in the band which Buckingham accepts on condition that his musical partner and girlfriend Stevie Nicks also joins. And Fleetwood agrees. Welch later decides to move on to a solo career. And the lineup that will record Rumours has come together. In 1975, the new line-up released their first album together, the self-titled Fleetwood Mac, the band’s tenth studio album overall. The album was a breakthrough for the band and became a huge hit, reaching No. 1 in the US and selling over 7 million copies. Among the hit singles from this album were Christine McVie’s “Over My Head” and “Say You Love Me” and Stevie Nicks’ “Rhiannon“, as well as the much-played album track “Landslide“, a live rendition of which became a hit twenty years later on The Dance album. Coming off this huge success the band is actually in trouble. The Mcvies long troubled marriage is ending in divorce. Christie Mcvie begins to date the bands lighting director. Stevie Nicks and Lindsay Buckingham end their long relationship. Fleetwood whose marriage has already ended in divorce starts a relationship with Nicks. Could any five people be more conflicted? In 1977 Rumours was created. About that Buckingham Nicks album cover: Nicks later recounted: I was crying when we took that picture. And Lindsey was mad at me. He said, ‘You know, you’re just being a child. This is art.’ And I’m going, ‘This is not art. This is me taking a nude photograph with you, and I don’t dig it.’[14] I thought, ‘Who are you? Don’t you know me?’ … I couldn’t breathe. But I did it because I felt like a rat in a trap.[39] The seeds for that relationships end seems to have planted before there joining Fleetwood Mac. Help Wanted Morning Open Thread is looking for contributors —either occasional, or weekly. If interested, please contact Ozarkblue or officebss for more information. Attribution: Open source Lads and ladies. We aren’t stuck in the previous century here! [END] --- [1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2026/5/12/800031407/community/morning-open-thread-tueday-may-12th-greatest-album-ever/ Published and (C) by Daily Kos Content appears here under this condition or license: Site content may be used for any purpose without permission unless otherwise specified. via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds: gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/dailykos/