Fleetwood Mac's Tusk

33⅓ Main Series #77

by Rob Trucks

After Rumours became the best-selling single album of all-time, Fleetwood Mac asked Warner Brothers Records to buy them a studio (the label refused, costing both Warner Brothers and the band significant cash in the long run) and then handed the reins to their guitarist and resident perfectionist Lindsey Buckingham. �You know,� Buckingham said, �we had this ridiculous success with Rumours. We were poised to do another album, and I guess because the axiom 'If it works, run it into the ground' was prevalent then, we were probably poised to do Rumours II. I don't know how you do that, but somehow my light bulb that went off was, 'Let's just not do that. Let's very pointedly not do that.' �


Here, Rob Trucks talks to Lindsey Buckingham, as well as members of Animal Collective, Camper Van Beethoven, the New Pornographers, Wolf Parade, and the USC Trojan marching band in order to chart both the story and the impact of an album born of personal obsession and a stubborn unwillingness to compromise.

Genres: Music, Nonfiction

143 pages, Kindle Edition

First published November 1, 2009

Reviews

[Alan (the Lone Librarian rides again) Teder · Rating 2 out of 5]

A Gonzo Journalist's Tusk - 33 1/3 #77
A review of the original Continuum paperback edition (November 16, 2010) of the hardback original (November 2009) now published by Bloomsbury Academic.

Why don't you ask him if he's going to stay?
Why don't you ask him if he's going away?
Why don't you tell me what's going on? - excerpted lyrics from the song "Tusk."

As best as I know, the term gonzo journalism was invented by Hunter S. Thompson (1937-2005) to describe the type of reporting he did for Rolling Stone magazine back in the day. These were the articles from 1970 to 2004 collected in Fear and Loathing at Rolling Stone: The Essential Writing of Hunter S. Thompson (2011). So-called Gonzo Journalism went beyond the so-called New Journalism and not only insinuated the reporter into the story, but made them the actual main subject.

This oddball entry in the 33 1/3 series of books on significant rock and pop LPs/CDs says very little about Fleetwood Mac's follow-up to its massive breakthrough album of Rumours (1977). There are repetitive quotes from several interviews with FMac's Lindsay Buckingham stressing how he wanted the band to take a more experimental direction and not just record a Rumours 2. He managed this by recording some very offbeat demos at his home studio and then asking the band to replicate them as closely as possible.

Admittedly there is some sort of manic grandeur to the title song and its use of the horns and drums of the USC Trojan Marching Band which enters to build the song to its finale. But mostly the album has a schizoid quality to it as the 11 soft rock songs of Stevie Nicks and Christine McVie alternate with the 9 rough and ready tracks of Buckingham.

These occasional bits about the actual album are interrupted by stories of writer Rob Trucks days of growing up, the music he listened to, the girls / women he dated / married, the NYC apartment he lives in and its neighbours, the baseball writing that he does and so on. Then there are alternating chapters with other musicians who talk about being influenced by the unpredictable nature of the Tusk record. The most interesting of these was the information that the alt-rock band Camper Van Beethoven recorded an entire cover version of the original FMac album, something that I had not previously been aware of.



The front covers of the original Fleetwood Mac (1979) and the Camper Van Beethoven (2003) "Tusk" albums. Images sourced from Discogs.

But overall, I think you'd learn more about the Tusk album from reading its Wikipedia entry. In 33 1/3's Tusk you will learn about Rob Trucks' life though.

Soundtrack
Listen to the complete 2015 remastered original Tusk (1979) album via a YouTube playlist which begins here or on Spotify here.

Listen to the complete Camper Van Beethoven cover of the Tusk (2003) album via a YouTube playlist which begins here or on Spotify here.

Bonus Tracks
Listen to the 6 hour 5-CD Extended Deluxe version of FMac's Tusk (2015) which includes alternate tracks, remixes, demos and live recordings from subsequent tours on Spotify here.

Trivia and Links
Fleetwood Mac's Tusk was published as part of the initial group of Continuum 33 1/3 series of books surveying significant record albums, primarily in the rock and pop genres. The series is now published by Bloomsbury Academic. The GR Listopia for the 33 1/3 series is incomplete with only 139 books listed as of October 2024 (and the number ordering is incorrect). For an up-to-date list see Bloomsbury Publishing with 198 books listed for the Main Series as of October 2024. The Main Series does not include the 33 1/3 books in the Global series which focuses on music from the regions of Europe, Oceania, Japan, Brazil, South Asia and Africa. You can search through those at the World Music listing here.

[Aaron Hook · Rating 1 out of 5]

Rob Sucks

[Cory Chase · Rating 1 out of 5]

I'm not entirely sure what I just read.
As much as I fangirl myself over Lindsey Buckingham, there's too much of him in this personal diary of the author. Yes, Tusk is Lindsey's album, but where is Mick's perspective, Stevie's, Christine's, or even John McVie's take?? Honestly, where is the take on the album itself??

I have read other reviews that the book is purposely as eclectic as the album - but even if that is the case, it's incredibly annoying and tedious and does not work. Yet, in the beginning, the author warns that the reader will not like his book, which I thought was an admission that taking on and writing about Tusk could be an impossible and daunting feat to accomplish properly. Turns out, he correctly predicted my disposition at the end. Did I mention that he never really gets around to the album itself?

The other publication about Tusk called "Get Tusked" is far superior and worth the time of a fan; but beware, one of the authors likes to make it a lot about himself - however, since he was a producer and part of the making of the album, some concessions can be made. But this author, speaking of himself in the third person, makes this experience rather annoying and tedious (and yes, I repeated myself).

One star is enough for the effort; although with all the excessive quotes, it looks like a college freshman research paper stacked with more words from other sources than from their own hand.

[Avri · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reading non-fiction continues to be confounding.

I found this title far more engaging than many of the other dozen-plus I've explored in this series, despite the fact that Tusk is an album I know and love far less than those others.

A fun, eclectic read with a unique voice that had me laughing out loud on the subway at times.

[Emma Fox · Rating 5 out of 5]

love fleetwood mac, love this book

[John · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this as research for a piece I’m writing on Fleetwood Mac, but I want to talk a little bit here about how the book is formally arranged. Like a few other 33 1/3 entries – the one on Guided by Voices’ Bee Thousand comes immediately to mind – Trucks takes an album that’s accepted as formally “difficult” or unconventional, and writes about it in a formally unconventional way, or actually a way that formally mimics the unconventional structure of the album it’s describing.

I’ve seen reviews on Goodreads that criticize this and other 33 1/3’s for having too much autobiography, and this one’s probably guilty of that as well. But I found it interesting that Trucks makes no attempt at overtly relating his own memoir material (which he estimates in the introduction as roughly 1/6 of the book) with the stuff on, you know, Tusk and Fleetwood Mac. This is actually key to the structure of the book – it reads more like a Rubik’s Cube of facts and information, with most sections of each chapter being less than a half-page long (and the pages are pretty small). Again, this actually mimics the somewhat haphazard, mostly unrelated song structures that run the gamut of Tusk’s 20 songs. I found many payoffs within the text between the little narratives, much like all the little payoffs on Tusk that aren’t immediately apparent (I’m actually, roughly 20 years after first hearing it, finally warming up to Tusk; been a fan of Rumours and Fleetwood Mac since hearing them when they came out, before I was in grade school.)

[Neil · Rating 1 out of 5]

Turgid drivel, avoid, don't waste your money

I really had high hopes of this book, it was a rare treat to find a book written on the largely ignored Tusk album instead of Rumours, however how disappointed was I in this read, it seems as through the author thought that they had secured interviews with the band and when these supposed interviews never happened the author filled the space within the book with random notes of nothingness, so very disappointing and such a shame, I count myself as a huge fan of the band and would consume anything written or played that involved the band, but I draw the line at reading a book written by an author that has an axe to grind and rather then do some more research they decided to fill the gaps in the book with turgid drivel, no doubt needing to complete so they could get paid, such a shame! All I want to know is where I can get the few hours back that I spent reading this rubbish, however the book did finally become useful as the pages burnt well on the fire!

[Drew Raley · Rating 4 out of 5]

A perverse exercise in taking the long way round to get to the point, the book is, like the album, a difficult and ultimately worthy folly.

[Len or Len · Rating 3 out of 5]

One of my favorite albums, but this book focuses mainly on Lindsey Buckingham.

[Michael Messaros · Rating 1 out of 5]

A goddamn trial. Nothing in this book is better than being done with it.

[Andrew · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is perhaps the perfect response or perspective on Fleetwood Mac’s 1979 double LP album ‘Tusk’, in that as per that release Rob Truck has produced a work that is part inspiration, part annoyance. A rather idiosyncratic take on its source this book doesn’t follow any standard critical appraisal narrative or historical framework. In effect it is a personal account of the author’s own experiences, perhaps manipulated for the purposes of the book, aligned with a focus on Lindsay Buckingham who is positioned as the fulcrum for the creation of ‘Tusk’. It is a provocative approach and one that may alienate the reader, just as the Fleetwood Mac album did the same after its release.

There is a reasonable quantity of critical analysis and historical accounting in this text. Truck does provide some interesting and valid observations as to the making and effect of the Fleetwood Mac album. However, the question is how much of this content is lost or sacrificed through his focus on his own personal narrative. Because of this attention paid to himself and/or a fictional version of himself there is not much room left in this rather short book to talk about an all-encompassing understanding or appreciation of ‘Tusk’. Throw in comments and observations that the author has brought in from third parties, including other bands and even a member of the University of Southern California Trojans marching band, and there is not really much to go on for the reader who wants an in-depth study of ‘Tusk’. It might be argued that this is a very narrow, specific and limited appreciation of the Fleetwood Mac LP.

Having said that there is still a lot to be taken from this book. Truck does make some interesting observations as to the place of the album in the overall canon of Fleetwood Mac album releases. He also makes certain that he positions the album in the history of the group, contextualised against earlier releases and later ones. The fact that the author has made so much about the role of Buckingham in the production of ‘’Tusk’’, his artistic and personal agendas, and the ramifications of his (arguably) flawed oversight or dominance of the group on the album makes for a worthy subject, an interesting study. Perhaps the author goes to far in minimising the other members of Fleetwood Mac, especially Christine McVie and to a lesser extent Mick Fleetwood and John McVie. yet when all is said and done the proposition that is argued throughout this book about Buckingham and his volatile ex partner Stevie Nicks is worthy of sustained consideration.

It’s worth mentioning that Truck does not attempt rehabilitation or re-appraisal of ‘Tusk’, though he does argue it is more meritorious than perceived shortly after its release. There are sufficient grounds for the author to commend the album as something of a slightly miscued reinvention of Fleetwood Mac‘s sound and he provides supportable theses in the text. Perhaps the most telling statement he makes is when he compares the album to the so-called white album from the Beatles. There is certainly some degree of similarity in how disparate and diverse the constituent musical voices in both albums are. Both albums could be considered to be compilation recordings of unfulfilled solo artists yet to escape their respective bands.

This book has provided this reviewer with some ideas to ponder and insights into the Fleetwood Mac album that word there before reading Truck’s text. This is not a perfect book and it has to be said in the authors defence that he does state categorically early in his narrative that he will not meet all of his potential readers expectations. You have been warned that this is not the book that you might think it could or should be. Having said that it is still worthy of reading, especially for those people who are devoted to or at least highly engaged with the music of Fleetwood Mac. If this book will achieve anything outside of what I’ve already stated in this review it should at least encourage its readers to listen to the album. That in and of itself is a praiseworthy result for Truck and for the publishes.

[A Proper Reader · Rating 3 out of 5]

Truly feeling like what did I just read? I’ll give this book a lot of credit for sending me into an obsessive Tusk/ Lindsey Buckingham/ Fleetwood Mac binge over the past few days.
I appreciate Trucks mission, he’s trying to be as artistic and eclectic in writing this as Fleetwood Mac was in making Tusk, and for that he did a great job. However there was like actually no commentary on the album itself? And what there was was only on a select few Buckingham tracks.
Luckily, I’m an obsessive enough FM fan girl that I didn’t need to hear it, but if I didn’t already know everything about every song I would’ve pretty weirded out by this approach. There was plenty of praising of Lindsey Buckingham’s guitar and production talent, well deserved I must say, but there was some totally unnecessary shade on Christine and Stevie’s writing.
Sure Stevie Nicks has gotten plenty of flowers over the years, so she doesn’t need one more piece of praise, but discrediting her as a writer when she has written lines like,
“Every hour of fear I spent, my body tries to hide
Living through each empty night, a deadly call inside”
And among Lindsey’s worst songwriting moments are pieces with little more than 2 original lines.
Anyhow, I think this is an important book for any Fleetwood Mac or music history buff, but I don’t really know how to feel about it right now..

[justin roth · Rating 3 out of 5]

At first upon finishing I was kinda like “what the fuck” in regards to the autobiographical nature of many sections of the book, but then I saw a review on here that the author’s inclusion of his own life without really connecting to the story of Tusk is kind of like a metaphor for Tusk itself- a mashup of mismatched sections strung together for better or worse into a single work. And that kind of tied it together for me- I did enjoy the author’s life passages even if they weren’t necessarily related to the topic of the book.
However, as a music and production dork, I really did wanna know a little more about the production of the record. Like its briefly mentioned that at some point Lindsey Buckingham taped a mic to the ground and sang over it in pushup position, and I would definitely have liked to know more about that sort of thing. But I can always Google that. What I did get here was a much more comprehensive understanding of Fleetwood Mac as a band which lends itself in no small part to revealing the significance of Tusk. All in all this was a great read- short enough for my fucked attention span to focus and genuinely interesting and artistically stirring.

[Spencer Abrams · Rating 3 out of 5]

So, the nature of "33 1/3" books is: every single one of 'em is different. Andrew WK's "I Get Wet," as covered by Phil Crandall is a full-fledged rock-doc. MJ's "Dangerous" as covered by Susan Fast is a navel-gazing critical theory essay. Rob Trucks' Fleetwood Mac's "Tusk" is more like a scrapbook. There are bits of Lindsey comment, bits of the author's life story, bits of recursive gags and near-poetry, and bits of interviews with other musicians who have crossed paths with the 1979 cokesterpiece, Tusk. All these bits are very uneven. The interview bits are really cool and insightful. The bits of Trucks' life story are kind of funny. He's making the comparison that Tusk is an ego-driven self-portrait, and so is his book about Tusk. That's okay. But it's just way too much. He's complaining about how the 20-something girl who lives upstairs has friends over and fucks too much. C'mon, man.

Don't say that you love me!

[Alexis Roth · Rating 1 out of 5]

I don’t think this author knows that it’s possible to praise men without bringing down women. This whole book not only idolizes Lindsay Buckingham, but it also brings down all the accomplishments of Christine McVie and Stevie Nicks. And while tusk may have been primarily Buckinghams album, there were other contributors and this book backhandedly in every snobby critics way, insults the contribution of the women in the band.

It also explains the fact that introducing the author to the story is needed, but I felt most examples of this were utterly self centered and pointless. There is no need to make a reader search for the meaning in a work, especially a nonfiction.

If tusk is a symbol, then explain it in plain terms instead of the backhanded way that is presented.

[Jack Hatcher · Rating 3 out of 5]

Hmm… 3.5 I think. Worth reading for fans of Fleetwood Mac and Lindsey Buckingham.

Whilst the author is up front and honest about interviews being cancelled and him having to pad the book out with his own story it did feel disjointed at times to the point that I would stop and wonder what I’m even reading about.

However when the book did focus on Fleetwood Mac it was engaging and interesting!

[Michael · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting addition to the 33 1/3 series where writers can send a proposal to write a short book about an album. Naturally, I had to read Rob Trucks' dive into Fleetwood Mac's Tusk, and album that I love, and that fascinates me. Trucks comes at the album as many do as the post-Rumours double-album release that was taken over by Lindsey Buckingham. It was way ahead of its time and people just didn't know what to make of it, but through interview with Buckingham himself, as well as members of Animal Collective, Camper Van Beethoven, the New Pornographers, Wolf Parade and more he explores the album deeply, with a parallel, personal through-line to give color to his obsessions.

[Kevin · Rating 2 out of 5]

Album is way better than the book

[Zach · Rating 2 out of 5]

Tusk both deserves more and less.

[Juliana · Rating 2 out of 5]

If the point was to make a mess of a book about a mess of an album, then it succeeded.

[Jonny Brick · Rating 4 out of 5]

How do you follow up one of the biggest album's ever made? Shed your audience, get the USC marching band, get weird and 'only' sell 5m copies. A bold failure, sensitively written about by a fan.

[Nate · Rating 1 out of 5]

Absolute garbage

No doubt you've heard Maya Angelou's saying, "When people tell you who they are, believe them." Trucks begins this disaster with "There's a good chance you won't like this book." He then confesses that he is "basically a guy with no particular insight into the inner workings of either the band or the album in question." He says that he is inserting a lot of himself into the book and thus will be roasted by the critics for it. Lots of irony mixed with sarcasm. The rest of the book is a bunch of quotes from Lindsay Buckingham that anyone can find on the internet.

That is all you need to know.

The editors of the series have a lot to answer for for letting this abysmal piece of crap be published. Zero insight, self-indulgent twaddle. And if the point of the book is that Trucks mirrors in his writing the idosyncratic nature of the album itself, then that too is a failure. No one cares about Trucks.

I did something with my copy that I have never done before with any book: I ran it through a paper shredder, to ensure that no one else would be able to pick up my copy and potentially waste one second of their life with this trash.

The minute that you are taking to read my review is enough. Don't waste another second thinking about this "book." Move on.

[Tim Byron · Rating 3 out of 5]

Rob Trucks' take on Tusk is an interesting but ultimately failed enterprise. Oddly, you get the impression that Trucks knows this - the book starts with an apology, and Trucks obviously lays the blame for the book's failure at the feet of Lindsey Buckingham, who promised detailed interviews but ultimately didn't consent to an interview specifically about Tusk.

One quirk of the book is that about 20% of it is a narrative about Trucks' life which, again, he apologizes for at the outset. I didn't mind that being there, but I didn't think it worked; I wanted those sections to explain why Trucks loved Tusk so much that he wanted to write an album about it, why a song like 'Not That Funny' might matter to him - instead you get the impression either that Tusk isn't that important to him or that he can't articulate why he likes it.

And in fact, you do get the sense that Trucks doesn't really have much to say about Tusk fullstop - he's more interested in Fleetwood Mac in general, and in fact devotes pages to the way Buckingham rearranges the 1987 single 'Big Big Love' for modern live performances, for example.

There is stuff to like about the book though - his interviews of indie musicians, cover band musicians, a member of the marching band on the song 'Tusk' and associates of Buckingham are illuminating, and it's interesting to compare what they like about the album and dislike. And I did learn something from the small snatches of interview with Buckingham that Trucks did get, and from some of the details of Fleetwood Mac's history that I had been unaware of.

[Eva Becker · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked this a lot more than I thought I would while I was reading it. Rob Trucks works in a third-person autobiography, largely unrelated to Tusk, Fleetwood Mac, or even music. He starts with a little introduction stating he's aware it will probably not be well received, apparently an attempt to mirror Lindsey Buckingham's risky and unconventional creative approach to Tusk and the time-and-place nature of the album. At first it all seemed a little forced and contrived, though all of the quotes from Lindsey Buckingham about his own process in recording Tusk and insights into what it meant for the band were super interesting. But by the end I think Rob Trucks actually achieved what he intended and the effect was close to powerful. Recommended, especially if you're super into Fleetwood Mac and earnest literary experimentation.

[Doug · Rating 2 out of 5]

The author starts off the book telling me I won't like it. He's right. This book isn't really about Tusk; it's about what people think about Tusk. It's also about the author's cross-country running, his noisy upstairs neighbor, and something about guys who didn't play in the majors very long. Lindsey Buckingham is the only member of Fleetwood Mac he interviewed for the book. He probably should have just done a book about Lindsey Buckingham. You really won't learn much about Tusk.

But maybe THIS IS THE BOOK HE WANTED TO WRITE, similar to how TUSK IS THE ALBUM BUCKINGHAM WANTED TO MAKE. Get it? So the reader's expectations won't be met, similar to how people expecting Tusk to be Rumours II didn't get what they wanted either. If that's the case, mission accomplished. But as a book about an album, it's not good. But hey, I was warned, so he gets a bonus star for that.

[Nathan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Perhaps the introduction begging me to not like this book led me to rebel, and like it anyways. While I don't really feel that it excelled at getting to the heart of Tusk, I definitely enjoyed the literary style present throughout. The reading was simple, and the book was not bogged down by excessive gear head technology, so that's always nice. Not sure exactly who the last chapter fits, but I just finished it, so maybe in a few days it will sink in.

[Jesse · Rating 3 out of 5]

I don't ask for a whole lot out of my 33 1/3 books -- some Behind the Music theatrics, some Classic Albums insights, and maybe some structural hijinks to keep things fresh. For the most part, Rob Trucks' was satisfying, though I wanted more specifics about the recording itself. I wasn't sold on the personal angle in the case of this 33 1/3, as it didn't seem to tie terribly convincingly to the "text" of the album, which itself seemed somewhat hidden.

[Nicholas · Rating 4 out of 5]

As he states, one of those books where the author interjects himself into the story. There was less and less eye rolling as it went along and there was a dig at Malcolm Gladwell at the end that made the whole conceit worthwhile and probably gave the book an extra star...
A good little read. Probably not going to make you appreciate the album any more...

[Megan · Rating 3 out of 5]

It almost, almost worked. I didn't hate it, but I feel like he had some interesting thoughts about Tusk from an critical point of view, and would touch on them and then skitter away to talk about his upstairs neighbor again. The writing style was interesting and I don't mind the self-insertion, but definitely something unsatisfying about it.

[Jonathan Bloom · Rating 3 out of 5]

A little too much autobiographical content. More of a book about Lindsey Buckingham than about Fleetwood Mac. However, the writing is unique, entertaining, and often times funny. I enjoyed it despite its flaws. P.S. If you like the song-by-song breakdown many authors provide in 33 1/3 books, don't expect one here.