After the controversial firing of Lindsey Buckingham in 2018, Stevie Nicks has commented on the incident for the first time three years after. “It’s unfortunate that Lindsey has chosen to tell a revisionist history of what transpired in 2018 with Fleetwood Mac,” Nicks wrote to Rolling Stone. “His version of events is factually inaccurate.”

Her statement continued to say that the start of the downfall was at a Musicare event in 2018. “Following an exceedingly difficult time with Lindsey at MusiCares in New York, in 2018, I decided for myself that I was no longer willing to work with him. I could publicly reflect on the many reasons why, and perhaps I will do that someday in a memoir, but suffice it to say we could start in 1968 and work up to 2018 with a litany of very precise reasons why I will not work with him. To be exceedingly clear, I did not have him fired, I did not ask for him to be fired, I did not demand he be fired. Frankly, I fired myself. I proactively removed myself from the band and a situation I considered to be toxic to my well-being.”

Buckingham first claimed he didn’t receive the news from his bandmates, but from their manager, Irving Azoff. “Stevie never wants to be on a stage with you again,” Azoff allegedly told him. Buckingham then stated in a Rolling Stone interview that he was fired after asking Fleetwood Mac to postpone an upcoming tour for three months in order for him to release and tour his latest solo album at the time. The band refused, but he had offered a compromise of booking his own shows in the same cities as the Fleetwood Mac ones. He believes his termination was related to that.

He was then replaced with guitarists Mike Campbell, who has played with Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers and frontman of the band Crowded House Neil Finn.

Shortly after, Buckingham sued the band for his termination, charging them for breach of fiduciary duty, breach of oral contract and intentional interference with prospective economic advantage.  The lawsuit was settled a couple of months after.

Nicks recently canceled her 2021 tour dates due to the COVID-19 surge.  “While I’m vaccinated, at my age, I am still being extremely cautious and for that reason have decided to skip the five performances I had planned for 2021.”

Photo Credit: Mauricio Alvarado