Veteran music writer and editor Alan Light’s latest book, “Don’t Stop: Why We (Still) Love Fleetwood Mac‘s ‘Rumours’, is out today at Atria Books.
Since its release in 1977, Fleetwood Mac’s “Rumours” has carved out a notable place in the pop music pantheon. Created in a cauldron of romantic turmoil within the band as several relationships within the band crashed and burned, and fueled by voracious drug taking, the album was an instant, spectacular success. Certified 21 times platinum, it is the seventh best-selling record in US history (worldwide, it has sold more than 40 million copies).
But nearly 50 years later, the album has achieved something none of its peers can claim: “Rumours” is the only classic rock album that continues to attract young listeners. It’s the only record from rock’s Greatest Generation that doesn’t sound old to successive generations—somehow, after all this time, it plays not like a “classic,” but like today’s pop.
In 2023, “Rumours” was the most streamed album of the 20th century on Spotify (the platform did not release that statistic for 2024). The songs “Go Your Own Way” and “The Chain” have more than a billion plays each on Spotify, with their younger listener base than traditional radio, while “Dreams” has more than 2 billion, more beloved and ubiquitous hits like “Bohemian Rhapsody” and “Don’t Stop Believin’.”
Week in and week out, “Rumours” is not just that catalog album on the Billboard Top 100 — It’s usually parked around No. 25, although it recently peaked as high as No. 14 — it’s also the only one that isn’t a Greatest Hits compilation. As the vinyl boom continues, LP-buying Cool Kids have earned “Rumours” a permanent top ten spot on this list, alongside the likes of Taylor Swift, Billie Eilish and Sabrina Carpenter. Incredibly, in 2024, “Rumours” was the best-selling rock album of the year by any artist, old or new.
This current wave of interest is nothing new. “Rumours” has been consistently thrown back into the spotlight and onto the charts, from an entire “Rumours” episode of “Glee” to 2020 TikTok phenomenon featuring a guy on a skateboard lip-syncing to “Dreams” to the popular novel and TV series “Daisy Jones & the Six”, inspired by the Fleetwood Mac story.
Curious to better understand this unique cultural wonder, for my new book, “Don’t Stop: Why We (Still) Love Fleetwood Mac’s ‘Rumours’,” I spoke with nearly 30 post-millennials about their relationship with the album—students and young professionals, men and women, from across the country. What I heard from them was often surprising and challenged some of the basic assumptions those of us who grew up with the album had in real time.
Historically, “The Rumor” is framed as a story of anger, rage, simmering tension. During recording, the romantic relationship between guitarist/vocalist Lindsey Buckingham and singer Stevie Nicks dissolved; the marriage of bassist John McVie to keyboardist/singer Christine McVie ended; and drummer Mick Fleetwood split with his wife (and eventually, briefly, took up with Nicks). It tops every list of “The Greatest Break-Up Albums of All Time.” Paste magazine wrote that “the album is the 11-track musical equivalent of a withering round of he said/she said.”
But in my conversations with Gen Z fans, few of them talked about “The Rumor” in terms of its pain or the agony of its creation, even if they had studied the background. Most striking were the listeners who emphasized how happy “Rumours” makes them, and that its purpose for them, contrary to its stormy reputation, is nothing but good vibes.
“I reach for the album when I’m in a good mood,” says Charlotte Primrose (born 2007). “It has a lot of songs I want to listen to when I feel most happy and carefree.”
While most younger listeners are fascinated by the soap opera behind the album, the full spectrum of emotions – expressed on songs like “You Make Loving Fun” or “Songbird” – is just as important to them as the turmoil.
“I think it’s quite joyful in general,” said Viv Tullis (born 2004). “I would listen to it when I was with my friends and we were going out or when I was riding my bike to school. If I was going through a breakup, ‘Rumours’ probably isn’t what I would choose.”
In a more multicultural world, the “white guys with long hair and guitars” model seems outdated, and the gender composition of Fleetwood Mac kept coming up in my conversations. For first-generation “Rumours” listeners, it’s the story of Stevie vs. Lindsey that defines the album, but for 21st century fans, the relationship between Stevie Nicks and Christine McVie is central.
Almost all mixed-gender bands from that era have a single female member, usually the lead singer or bassist (Heart and the B-52s being the other high-profile exceptions). So the fact that Fleetwood Mac has several female singer/songwriters — “Rumours” is the best-selling album in US history with the majority of its songs written and sung by women — is central to its importance to post-millennials.
“I especially love the relationship between Stevie and Christine,” said Lauren Ostuni (born 1994). “They could have very easily been pitted against each other. But they were like, ‘No, we’re two women in a male-dominated industry, we have to have each other’s backs,’ and they’ve been sisters since day one.”
“Stevie Nicks and Christine’s friendship is very empowering for women,” adds Kaylee Dinwiddie (born 2000), “because it didn’t seem like they were in competition. Within their music or their friendship, it seemed like they were their own people, and it gave space for both of them to show their story and their writing. It makes me think about my own friendship and space for my friends.”
It was completely unexpected to hear that an album created and defined by such chaos was inspiring to these listeners. But they know something we didn’t know in 1977. They see how history turned out — that in the end, as captured in the album’s beloved and prescient track “The Chain,” the band moved on beyond this tumultuous moment (though it would be far more tumultuous in Fleetwood Mac’s story), that the music prevailed, that the explosive passion is almost resurrected in a half-century of something like “Rum” remains.
Learning about the madness surrounding ‘Rumours’ was initially confusing for Louisa Carey (born 1999), but over time it has come to represent something more uplifting. “I just couldn’t get over the idea that they were all still making an album while breaking up with each other,” she said. “I didn’t understand the idea that you could be in a relationship and everything was very messy and complicated. It was very confusing as a child.
“But as I get older,” she continued, “I find enormous comfort in that, that all these really chaotic things happened in these people’s lives but then everything turned out fine. Everything can be really raw and visceral and then time will pass, and things will work out one way or another.”
Overall, “The Rumor” may strike differently to those born before and after its release, but in its extreme emotion it resonates across generations. There is something viscerally youthful about the project that is key to its endless popularity. Unlike its classic rock contemporaries, “Rumours” continues to attract young listeners because it sounds and feels like it was created by young people, in all its furious glory.
As a fan, Ali Resich (born 1989), put it: “Part of why it’s so appealing to younger people is because of the intensity of emotion that went into the recording process. Not being able to escape without having to sit and create in it. It relates directly to what it’s like to be a teenager and super-anxious and really in all these powers and forces that you experience and experience for the first time. rawness comes out in the music.”
