Top 10 Fleetwood Mac Albums

Photo credits at the end of the article.

Our Top 10 Fleetwood Mac Albums list looks at the entire catalog of Fleetwood Mac albums. This includes all the band’s various lineups, from the band’s debut album in 1968 to their last studio release, Say You Will, in 2003. It’s hard to believe it’s been seventeen years since the last Fleetwood Mac studio album was released. From 1968 to 2003, Fleetwood Mac released eighteen studio albums. As all Fleetwood Mac fans will tell you, the band that released their debut album was far different from the group that released a series of multi-million dollars selling albums in the mid to late 1970s.

There are three separate Fleetwood Mac fan bases. Some fans from the early days love the band’s albums before Stevie Nicks and Lindsay Buckingham joined. There are fans who like everything from that point on. And of course, there are those who enjoy everything. This list is geared towards those who love all of the band’s lineups and also those who are unfamiliar with many of the group’s albums from all periods.

This won’t be easy, but it sure will be fun. These are our 10 favorite Fleetwood Mac albums. Let us know which ones you would have picked.

# 10 – The Dance

We open up our top 10 Fleetwood Mac albums with the Fleetwood Mac album The Dance. Yes, we know it’s a live album. We usually never put live albums on our top 10 list; we usually reserve them for the live album lists. However, Fleetwood Mac’s album The Dance was very significant in many ways. It had been ten years since the mid-seventies classic lineup had played together. Fleetwood Mac fans went crazy over this. The album shot straight to number one on the Billboard album charts. It became the fifth biggest-selling live album of all time. It was nominated for multiple Grammy Awards. Three big singles were released from the album, including the unreleased track “Silver Springs.”

The accompanying video was chilling in the way Stevie Nicks stared down Lindsey Buckingham throughout the night. Buckingham’s response was equally fascinating. You can see the tension, sense the love, and feel the hate. This concert and video displayed everything that made Fleetwood Mac as great as they were in the 1970s. How could we leave The Dance one off this list?

# 9 – Mystery To Me

Continuing with our top 10 Fleetwood Mac albums, we turn to the album Mystery To Me, released in October 1973. The album featured the classic Fleetwood Mac song “Hypnotized.” At this point in time, the band consisted of Mick Fleetwood on drums, John McVie on bass, Christine McVie on keyboards, and Bob Welch and Bob Weston on guitars.

# 8 – Bare Trees

The Fleetwood Mac album Bare Trees was released in March of 1972. At the time of release, the band that performed on the album consisted of Mick Fleetwood on drums, John McVie on bass, Christine McVie on keyboards, and Bob Welch and Danny Kirwan on guitars. The Bare Treess album would be Danny Kirwan’s final album with the band. The album did extremely well, having gone Gold when it was released. It would later benefit from the success of the Stevie Nicks / Lindsey Buckingham era as fans of that band brought back the catalog sending Bare Trees to achieve platinum-selling status.

The Fleetwood Mac album Bare Trees contained one of the most loved Fleetwood Mac songs from the pre-Stevie Nicks / Lindsey Buckingham era. Bob Welch’s song “Sentimental Lady” was one of the standout tracks on the album. Other standout tracks included Kirwans’ “Child of Mine,” “Dust,” and Sunny Side Of Heaven. Christine McVie’s songs “Homeward Bound” and “Spare Me a Little of Your Love” were also highlights of the album.

# 7 – Tango In The Night

Tango In The Night is the first Stevie Nicks / Lindsey Buckingham-era Fleetwood Mac album to be presented on this Fleetwood Mac albums list. The Tango In The Night album was released in April 1987. The album is historic because it was the last Fleetwood Mac studio album that utilized the multi-million dollar lineup of Mick Fleetwood, Christine McVie, John McVie, Stevie Nicks, and Lindsey Buckingham. The group released The Dance album in 1997, but as previously written, it was a live album based on a reunion.

The classic 1975 to 1978 lineup was built on releasing hit singles off their albums. Tango In The Night was no exception. Six singles were released from the Tango In The Night album. The album’s lead-off single, “Big Love,” was a top 10 hit in the United States on the Billboard Hot 100. The album’s third single, “Little Lies,” written by Christine McVie and Eddy Quintela, was an even bigger hit, peaking at number four on the Billboard Hot 100 and number one on the Billboard Adult Contemporary Charts.

# 6 – Peter Greens Fleetwood Mac

There needed to be a spot on this top 10 Fleetwood Mac albums list for the band’s debut album in 1968. Fleetwood Mac has released so many great and distinctively different albums throughout their career, it proved difficult to figure out where to place their debut album. In the end we felt it was best to place it right in the middle. The band’s debut album titled Peter Green’s Fleetwood Mac was a wonderful blues album that was very reflective of the late 1960s English Blues scene.

Three of the musicians on the album, Mick Fleetwood, John McVie, and Peter Green, had originally been members of the John Mayall & the Bluesbreakers band. After breaking away from John Mayall, Peter Green, Mick Fleetwood, John McVie, Jeremy Spencer, and Bob Brunning made one of the greatest blues rock albums of the 1960s. Over time, the album’s legacy has grown stronger as more rock fans discover this incredible album.

# 5 – Tusk

Fleetwood Mac was in a tough spot after the success of the Rumours album. How does a band follow up an album that broke all sales records and stood as one of the greatest albums released in an entire decade? The band’s response was to write and record as many songs as possible. That response resulted in the release of a double album called Tusk. What was interesting about the Tusk album was the band’s intent on not repeating the formula that was so successful on Rumours.

A few years later, we would see a similar artistic intent when Springsteen followed up Born In The U.S.A. with Tunnel of Love and Prince followed up Purple Rain with Around the World in a Day. Both artists had the albums of their careers like Fleetwood Mac had with Rumours. Yet, both Springsteen and Prince decided to go in a completely different artistic direction that would prove to be nowhere as successful as their previous hits albums, just like Fleetwood Mac did with Tusk,

Was it a smart move to go experimental on Tusk instead of repeating the Rumours formula? Well, that’s up to you to decide. Tusk was a great album. However, it would have been really interesting to hear Rumours II. Or then again, maybe not.

# 4 – Mirage

The Mirage album by Fleetwood Mac was released in June of 1982. Mirage is a really good Fleetwood Mac album that is too often ignored by fans and critics. The album contains one of Stevie Nicks’ most heartfelt and beautiful songs in her composition and recording of the song “Gypsy.” That one stands as one of our favorite Stevie Nicks songs of all time. Christine McVie’s big hit “Hold Me” also hit the Billboard Top 10 on the Hot 100 charts in 1982. The song was so popular it stayed in the top 10 for seven consecutive weeks.

Lindsey Buckingham was a dominant force on the album, composing five songs and singing lead on four. Fleetwood Mac’s Mirage album presented fans with twelve great new Fleetwood Mac songs that defined a very even album of great music and performances by each member. They may have all been releasing solo albums and immersed in outside relationships, but they were still a musical powerhouse when the band came together.

# 3 – Fleetwood Mac

As all Fleetwood Mac fans know, the album entitled Fleetwood Mac, which was released in 1975, was Steve Nicks and Lindsey Buckingham’s debut album with the band. It was an incredibly successful album that stands as the first record that turned on a mass audience to the band Fleetwood Mac. However, that mass audience was not found immediately upon the album’s release. The band toured ferociously to promote the record.

If there ever was an example of why promoting a record by touring was so important, one only has to look at the success of the 1975 Fleetwood Mac album. Over time, as the band continued to tour, the record started to take hold. Obviously, the band was not aware of the cult following that would soon latch onto Steve Nicks. The album’s first couple of singles, “Warm Ways” and “Over My Head,” were written and sung by Christine McVie.

With the release of the single “Rhiannon,” heads began to turn. The song interested many people in discovering the other Stevie Nicks songs on the record, such as “Landslide. There’s no doubt that the magical sound of Steve Nicks’ voice turned so many people onto the band. Of course, the harmonies, as were all the other songs the band wrote, were outstanding. The performances were top-notch. But in the end, the sound and look of Steve Nicks defined so much of what was to come from the group.

# 2 – Then Play On

The Fleetwood Mac album Then Play On is easily Fleetwood Mac’s most underrated album. It has stood in the shadows of the 1975 to 1987 lineup for far too long. Then Play On was the quintessential Fleetwood Mac album of the late 1960s that combined the band’s blues power with the idea of psychedelia and simply great songwriting and performances. The album featured musicians Peter Green on guitar and vocals, Danny Kirwan on guitar and vocals, John McVie on bass, Mick Fleetwood on drums, and a single appearance by Jeremy Spencer on piano.

The Fleetwood Mac album Then Play On did not originally feature the huge hit single “Oh Well.” The song was added quickly to the revised US album released also in 1969. The Then Play On album would be the last Fleetwood Mac album to feature Peter Green.

# 1 – Rumours

Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours album was released in February of 1977. It’s safe to say that while the band realized they had just completed a great album, they probably had no idea of the incredible success the album would achieve both commercially and critically. Rumours would not just stand as the most successful album released in 1977, it would become one of the top albums of the decade while standing as the band’s greatest musical achievement.

Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours album reached the number one spot on the Billboard Top 200 albums charts and stayed there for thirty-one straight weeks. That’s an incredible run. Many factors fueled the album’s success. One of them was hit singles. The Rumours album spawned four top 10 singles with the songs “Go Your Own Way” (issued two months before the album was released), “Dreams,” “Don’t Stop,” and “You Make Loving Fun”

Another factor was the soap opera effect. People love to hear gossip and juicy stories about relationships. There was no shortage of reporting on the band’s romantic struggles during the recording of Rumours. Within these struggles, supposedly, so many of the album’s wonderful songs were cast.

In classical rock history, there have been a handful of albums that fueled new musical trends and styles or at least established the pathway for certain artists to become some of the biggest stars of all time. Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours was the album that elevated the band to a place where only a handful of musical artists stand. It was incredibly wonderful to be sixteen years old at the time and watch it all unfold. It’s even more wonderful to be 61 and still listen with as much joy as I did when I was sixteen. I’m sure millions of other music fans feel the same way.