EXCLUSIVE: Inside Fleetwood Mac’s Battle Back From Bleak Abyss of Betrayal and Drugs to Make Their Greatest Ever Album — As Fans Get Set to Mark 50th Anniversary of Smash Record
Fleetwood Mac overcame betrayal and drugs to craft their greatest album ahead of its 50th anniversary.
Aug. 26 2025, Published 11:30 a.m. ET
Fleetwood Mac's Rumours is hailed as one of rock's defining records, but its creation came from chaos – a maelstrom of broken relationships, affairs and cocaine-fueled excess that nearly destroyed the band.
Now, as fans get set to mark the 50th anniversary of its release in 2027, RadarOnline.com can reveal the full, tortured story behind its creation.
Transforming The Band
Fleetwood Mac created 'Rumours' amid heartbreak and betrayal.
In 1975, after years of false starts and lineup implosions, Mac's drummer Mick Fleetwood, then 28, persuaded guitarist Lindsey Buckingham, then 26 and singer Stevie Nicks, then 27, to join the group.
Their arrival transformed the band from a fading British blues act into unlikely Californian hitmakers.
Their self-titled Fleetwood Mac – released half a century ago this year – went platinum, but its follow-up Rumours was the album that would cement their legend, even as the band collapsed under the weight of its own turmoil.
Mick said: "We were standing on the edge of extinction. Affairs, betrayal and drugs were tearing us apart, yet somehow it fueled the music. We were lucky to get out alive."
By 1976, bassist John McVie, then 30, and his wife, keyboardist Christine McVie, then 33, had separated.
Nicks and Buckingham's romance disintegrated in tandem. Mick himself discovered his wife was having an affair with another guitarist.
But all five still showed up to the studio each day. "We were breaking each other's hearts at night and recording harmonies together the next morning," said Christine.
"It was madness, but it gave the songs their rawness."
The band recorded while relationships collapsed behind the scenes.
The sessions for Rumours at the Record Plant in Sausalito became notorious.
Cocaine was ever-present, with one engineer recalling a communal bag left on the mixing desk.
Producer Ken Caillat later said: "I thought I was making a regular record, then I'd see champagne flying in someone's face, or Stevie and Lindsey screaming through the microphone. The drama was endless."
Out of this storm came songs that still resonate for music fans today.
Nicks wrote Dreams as a wistful elegy for her and Buckingham's relationship, while Buckingham countered with the barbed "Go Your Own Way."
"Stevie didn't like the line about 'shacking up,' but that was how I felt," Buckingham said. "There was so much truth, you couldn't change it."
The Band Faced Tough, Long Days
Mick Fleetwood admits the music was stronger than the band’s turmoil.
The band worked 12-hour days, often losing track of time.
Mick admitted: "We were obsessed. Warners would call me asking, Do we even still have a band? I told them, 'Yes – even if we have to crucify ourselves.'"
Released in February 1977, Rumours became a phenomenon, topping charts across the US, UK and beyond.
Singles including Don't Stop, The Chain andYou Make Loving Fun dominated radio.
At the last count, the album has sold more than 40 million copies worldwide, making it one of the best-selling records ever.
Yet the personal cost to Mac's members was immense. Nicks said: "We thought cocaine wasn't addictive. We used it to block out the pain. How wrong we were."
Mick later admitted he would have credited his dealer on the album sleeve – had the pusher not been murdered before its release.
The Band Still Remains Iconic
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Stevie Nicks and Lindsey Buckingham turned their split into classic songs.
But even at the height of the turmoil, the music bound the tormented band members together.
"The lyric of The Chain – 'I can still hear you saying you would never break the chain' – that was us," Mick said. "The music was stronger than any of us."
Now, 45 years on, the album's legacy endures.
As Nicks said: "I can hear a Fleetwood Mac song playing in the street and feel it in the ground beneath me. And it always makes me smile."
