Storms (28 page)

I burst out laughing as I told him, “Don't worry, baby … if you ever walk around with four inches of pancake on your face, you'll already be in hell.”

With the crisis averted to the extent that a fistfight hadn't started between Rogers and Lindsey, I settled happily into my chair for the show. And just in the nick of time, too, for the cameras were once again glued to our row of seats, their operators undoubtedly waiting for whatever Lindsey might do next. They seemed to constantly sweep our seats.

When it was time for the Album of the Year award, the band members were actually sitting in their seats like adults. Lindsey was smiling, nervous, and, most of all, alert. Except for the effect of the ten joints that he smoked each and every day, he was stone-cold sober. Clutching my hand tightly, he sat and held his breath as the members of Crosby, Stills, and Nash listed the nominees.
Rumours
was up against
Star Wars, Hotel California
, Steely Dan's
Aja
, and Jackson Browne's latest effort. All of them were amazing albums and Lindsey's nails were digging into my palm as Graham Nash stalled and goofed around for agonizing minutes before announcing the winner. Finally he came back to reality from whichever weird planet
he
was on and opened the envelope that would reveal Best Album of the Year.

“And the Grammy goes to: Fleetwood Mac's
Rumours!”

“Oh my God, oh my God, Lindsey! Congratulations, baby!” I whispered into his ear as he sat frozen beside me. With a huge grin, he kissed me quickly, let go of my hand, and rose from his seat.

Stunned, euphoric, and victorious, the band members, along with Richard Dashut and Ken Caillet, raced up the stairs to the podium and said a few words before the Grammy orchestra cut them off.

In less than an hour's time we were all backstage in a large room reserved for the after-show press conferences that were given by the winners of that year's Grammys. While Lindsey stood in front of a dozen microphones with the rest of Fleetwood Mac, I stood alone in the back of the room, waiting for him

Suddenly, as if from nowhere, at least fifteen photographers surrounded me. Blinding me with the strobe lights from their cameras, they took my picture over and over again as I stood and smiled, enjoying and relishing
every second of how it must feel to be a star. It didn't matter to me that I was not a famous person in my own right—I was quite comfortable in my role as “famous by association.” But during those moments I felt just like Cinderella, covered by fairy dust as I got to live through ten minutes of focused attention from press photographers from all over the world.

It would remain a moment frozen in time for me, as it would have for most women who had grown up reading fairy tales. For, along with the members of Fleetwood Mac, I was living through a fantasy night when the dreams of a lifetime had come true. And on this one night, every single member of the sixteen-strong Fleetwood Mac family was blissfully euphoric.

But nights like these, when all of us were serenely, completely happy, would be few and far between.

After the intense months of touring, nonstop interviews, and awards shows, it was a relief for the whole Fleetwood Mac family to be able to take four months off. For Lindsey and me, however, our much-needed break had taken on a dimension that made the pressure of being on the road pale in comparison.

Like most people, I thought that the awards Fleetwood Mac had received at the AMAs and the Grammys would be all the proof they needed that the band was recognized as a brilliant creative force. Maybe for the other four band members it was. For Lindsey, the awards inspired him, but they also terrified him.

The success of the album and tour was so great that it had become a heavy burden for him to bear. How does a musician top an album that has broken all records in the music industry? An album that had sold millions of copies and was beloved by people all over the world? The pressure of living up to the success of
Rumours
had become a living, breathing presence in our lives, and it consumed every minute of every day.

We sat and talked about it from morning until night. We went shopping at Tower Records, looking for the newest and most experimental bands on the market. Talking Heads and the Sex Pistols were played around the clock over the stereo system in our den. Lindsey was completely blown away by the music of these amazing bands and it triggered a hunger in him: a hunger to grow as a musician and to let his creative talent take him wherever it may lead.

He was also tortured because the world was waiting for another, newer version of
Rumours.
That fact was threatening to tear apart the man I loved,
for Lindsey burned with a desire to create something new, something completely different. And his torment broke my heart with every discussion we had about his music.

The same anguished questions appeared again and again in our conversations. What if the new musical direction he craved resulted in music that was total crap? Should he play it safe and stay within the formula of Fleetwood Mac's music or trust his own creative urges and risk everything? And if he created radically different new music, then how would the band react to it? More importantly, how would the fans react to it?

I told him over and over that I believed he was a brilliant musician and a creative force, and that no matter what direction his music took him in, he had to go for it. If he didn't do that, then he'd never achieve his full potential as a musician. But this didn't mean he should follow in the footsteps of bands like Talking Heads and the Sex Pistols. It meant he should try to have them follow in his. And I asked him a question: whose admiration and respect means the most to you, the fans' or your musical peers'? “If you earn the respect of your musical peers with your new sound”, I said, “then the fans will love your music as well. It might take them a little while to get used to your new sound, but in the end they'll love it. I believe in you, Lindsey. You have to go for it.”

I knew I was only saying out loud what Lindsey himself knew to be true. But I also knew that even though I might be stating the obvious, he needed to talk to someone about his ideas and his fears, and who better than me? I was there, I loved him, and, unlike the band, the only stake I had in whatever decision he made was my need for him to be happy.

After each of these conversations Lindsey slowly but surely lost his doubt and anxiety about his creative abilities and became more and more excited about where they might lead him. And I was just as excited, for while I loved
Rumours
, I believed with all my heart that Lindsey was capable of breaking new ground with his music, and to me that was what it was all about. That was the epitome of achievement for any great artist. Lindsey had already proved how great a musician he was—who knew how much further his talent could take him?

But we both knew that the band was going to freak when Lindsey told them what he was planning to do. They wanted to do another
Rumours
type record and it went without saying that their reaction to his striking out
on his own—outside the winning formula—was not going to be favorable. That problem set off another intense discussion between the two of us, in which Lindsey made his feelings clear.

“I always use my best ideas for Stevie's and Christine's songs, Carol. This time, I want to use all of my creativity on my own songs. I don't have to see any of them for at least a few months. I'll tell the band when I'm ready for them to know what I'm doing. I have a lot of song ideas and I really want the freedom now to run with it, you know? You can be my sounding board, OK? You can tell me if my new stuff sucks.”

“It's not going to, Lindsey. If you think you need to be on your
own
to create then that's what you should do. And I agree, you don't need to sit through a band meeting about this right now, do you? It's your music. It's that simple, Lindsey. It's
your music.”

Within a week, Lindsey was setting up a recording studio in the maid's quarters behind our kitchen. Five days later he'd finished and proudly took me on a tour of his new home studio. Even though there was barely room to sit, much less walk through it, I stood and admired his handiwork from the hallway.

The two small rooms were packed full of equipment and instruments. The first held four professional tape recorders patched into a small mixing board. Microphones, guitars, cables, cymbals, and a child's piano that we'd bought at a toy store were all scattered throughout it. The second room was filled with so many different lead, acoustic, and bass guitars that Lindsey could have started his own retail outlet if he'd wished. In an adjoining small bathroom he'd set up drums in the bathtub and a snare drum and a microphone right in front of the toilet.

I burst into a fit of uncontrollable giggles as I pictured Lindsey sitting on the john playing the drums. “I'm sorry, Lindsey, but talk about
convenient!
Jeez! I mean, if you have to pee, you'll barely have to move a muscle. The minutes you save by not having to run to the bathroom could cut hours off your recording time.” I tried to stifle my laughter as he gave me a look that told me he was not amused.

“Hey, the sound in here is fuckin' amazing, Carol. Don't give me any shit.”

We both burst into hysterics at his unintended pun, Lindsey almost choking on the smoke from one of his ever-present joints. “Wait until you
hear the sound I can get in here—the tiles on the wall and floor create some of the best acoustics I've ever heard”, he said proudly. “I'm also going to do some vocals in here. I'll set up a different mike for that when I need to. It's gonna work, believe me.”

Of course, he knew exactly what he was doing. In the weeks and months to come, Lindsey would record incredible vocals closeted within the tiny eightby-ten-foot bathroom. Within hours of giving me the grand tour he was already working on his new songs. I didn't think I'd ever seen him so excited.

Our days fell into a pattern. Lindsey woke up early and raced downstairs to the studio.

And slowly but surely, the songs that would be his contribution to the new album began to emerge. As they did, I became intimately familiar with every step of their creation. Lindsey, being much more
technically
proficient than Stevie Nicks, composed his music in a radically different manner. Unlike Stevie, who composed all of her songs with lyrics and a melody line first, Lindsey created his from the ground up. He explained to me that as far as he was concerned, it was the “basic track” that was one of the most critical elements to a song. The basic track consisted of the rhythm section and drums, and the music created from it formed the song's fundamental structure. From this, a melody emerged that was almost organic in nature because it grew from the emotions expressed in the music of the basic track, emotions drawn from the wellspring of Lindsey's creativity.

The lyrics, Lindsey told me over and over, were almost an afterthought once the musical portion of the song was finished. He hated writing lyrics and felt that he wasn't good at it. I laughed in his face every time he said this, because I, along with millions of fans, had
heard
his lyrics. And I knew without a shadow of a doubt that the lyrics to each of his songs on the earlier
Fleetwood Mac
album and
Rumours
were absolutely friggin' brilliant.

Also, I knew the man I loved. There was no way that he could ever make me believe that his lyrics were “beside the point.” The lyrics on “So Afraid”, for instance, seemed to come from deep inside his soul; they were words that still upset me each and every time I heard them. When I eventually heard the lyrics to his new set of songs, I would be convinced that Lindsey's musical genius was all encompassing.

As I listened and watched him at work, I was fascinated by the complexity of making a song. Long familiar with the mechanics of recording and
mixing music, I was seeing for the first time how that music was created—and it was unlike anything that I'd ever been exposed to. I was witnessing an artist at work, and opportunities like that are few and far between. It was a world that I'd been allowed to enter by invitation only.

For the first time in our relationship, I would not be just an observer or a good listener during Lindsey's creative journey but also an emotional participant as I willingly assumed a role that felt as natural to me as breathing. It was a role that would, from that point on, become a critical part of our relationship. For we discovered that I had the innate ability to be a muse for him. A muse who was not, perhaps, the source of inspiration, but one who cleared a path for inspiration to come to him in whatever forms he needed. And it consumed every minute of every single hour in my life. That my role in Lindsey's creative world would almost destroy me piece by piece during my years with him was, at that time, beyond my comprehension. I would eventually become a tool for Lindsey to use in his music and, as willing as I was to be so, I didn't see the insidious danger of it until it was much too late. And when I did, I would not have the strength to save myself—for when you give everything of yourself to another person, in the end, there's nothing left to give to yourself.

But, as with most things that later have a great impact on your life, it all began simply, as a matter of course. Lindsey and I were incredibly close to each other emotionally, having spent the majority of our time side by side, twenty-four hours a day, since we had met. We were so close that we seemed to be able to read each other's minds. Each night as he came out of his primitive studio, I could tell exactly what kind of song he'd been working on just by the expression in his eyes. Intensely aware of the deep fears that he harbored about this new creative road that he'd chosen to follow, I quickly learned how to use all of my emotional support as a kind of lifeblood that he could pour back into his music.