All the Fleetwood Mac drama that inspired Daisy Jones & the Six

Sex, drugs and rock and roll. These are some of the core tenets that make up the music fame game as we know it, but never more so in the '70s when love was free and social media didn't exist to show it all in real-time. This era of rock royalty is a prime breeding ground for TV and film adaptations, and no group created more drama on and off stage, with equally terrible and incredible results, than Fleetwood Mac. 

In all the promo for Amazon's latest series Daisy Jones & The Six, you'd be forgiven for thinking it's a straight biopic of Fleetwood Mac's hippy heyday. It's all fringed waistcoats, big hair, love triangles and really, really great music. But while the series isn't a straight take on the group, it is heavily, unofficially inspired by them.

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Taylor Jenkins Reid, who wrote the original book the series is based on, admitted she crafted the story of a '70s rock band's success torn apart by intra-group turmoil after watching Fleetwood Mac perform and absorbing their headline-grabbing liasons. The tortured love affairs, break-ups and, as a result, some of the best songs ever created, offer great inspiration for a series, perhaps because most of it feels too spectacular to actually be real. But it was, and here are some of the foundational Fleetwood Mac dramas that influence Daisy Jones & The Six. 

Many cite Rumours as the biggest moment of carnage from Fleetwood Mac's decades-long dabble with implosion, but a propensity for drama is part of the band's roots. The group was formed in the late ‘60s by Peter Green, with a revolving door of Mick Fleetwood and John McVie at various points. By the time ’70s rolled around, the group had found a footing with the addition of McVie's wife, keyboardist Christine McVie, and guitarist Bob Weston. 

In 1973, while on tour, Weston had an affair with Jenny Boyd, Fleetwood's wife, who he then divorced. Weston was fired from the band which set it up for the group's seminal Stevie Nicks and Lindsay Buckingham era. “[It was] the most expensive affair I’ve ever had in my life,” Weston said later. “Cost me a career, that did.

John and Christine McVie had been married since 1968, even before Fleetwood Mac ever really got off the ground. Despite being married for eight years, in interviews later they both agreed that strains in their relationship appeared early on in the group's tenure. 

Then there was Lindsey Buckingham and Stevie Nicks, who joined the group in 1975 as a package deal. The pair had known each other in high school but became a couple years later, with Buckingham saying he wouldn't join the band unless Nicks was brought in with him. But much like the McVie's, the pair said cracks were already showing in their early Fleetwood days. 

Despite this, their inclusion in the group made a solid foundation for the folk-rock sound they'd eventually become iconic for. It led to their self-titled album, which solidified their status as '70s rock legends with songs like “Over My Head” and “Rhiannon”. 

They say pain breeds great art, which is probably why 1977's Rumours is considered one of the greatest pieces of art of all time. Basically, everything was awful for Fleetwood Mac during this period: relationship breakdowns, affairs, drug abuse and fights.

Where to begin with Rumours? Well, to start, the record took over a year to record, which means that by the time it was released and they went on tour with it, none of the relationships at the start of the process existed anymore.

It didn't even take one recording session to break down the McVie's relationship, as the couple were already on the outs with their six-month tour right before being the final nail in the coffin. The pair didn't speak to each other apart from talking about music, choosing a ‘keep calm and carry on’ approach to their divorce. By comparison, Buckingham and Nick's on-and-off again 8-year romance was reaching a final fever pitch, with screaming matches between the pair resulting in long recording pauses and extended stretches in the studio. Fleetwood, away from the intra-office romances but never far from drama, re-married Boyd in this time, only to get divorced again a few years later. 

So fair to assume they'd never want to talk about any of it ever again, right? No, they recorded one of the best-selling albums of all time rammed full of tracks they'd have to perform for decades, fielding not-so-subtle musical digs at each other in almost every song. Songs that now define the group's iconic legacy are all basically calling each other out in some way.

Stevie Nicks wrote “Dreams”, now one of their most famous songs, with lyrics like “Now here you go again, you say you want your freedom/Well, who am I to keep you down?”, swiping directly at Buckingham.

Christine McVie penned the track “You Make Loving Fun”, a simple and beautiful love song espousing the joys of being in a relationship with someone you adore. The only problem was that it wasn't about her newly-axed husband, but about the lighting director she'd been having an affair with. To avoid conflict, she told McVie it was about her dog. 

Then there's “Go Your Own Way”, penned by Lindsey Buckingham. Just as Nicks had directly jabbed at Buckingham in “Dreams”, this takes aim back at her, with lyrics about being unable to love someone who doesn't know what they want. It was a personal song, but by the end of the album recording, it basically became an anthem for everything the group was going through. 

Finally, the crowning jewel of Rumours, “The Chain”, is a group anthem of betrayal. The song drips with desperation and frustration and you can almost feel the energy of that year-long recording session tear through the speakers. 

That's enough drama for one lifetime, wouldn't you say? Apparently not. Recording Rumours may have been a catharsis of sorts, but then came the collateral of having to perform all the songs and go on a tour that lasted more than a year together. 

During this time, the band's drug abuse hit an all-time high, so much so that Nicks damaged her voice and ended up with a coin-sized hole in her nose. Christine began a relationship with their sound engineer, which meant treading lightly around John. Then there was also the small matter of Nicks and Fleetwood striking up a short and very ill-advised affair while he was still remarried. 

Despite all the carnage of Rumours and the tour that followed, the group stayed working in their version of somewhat harmony for another decade. That was until 1987's Tango in the Night, the fifth and final album of Fleetwood Mac's. 

Unlike the powder keg of Rumours, Tango in the Night dragged on in recording because the group was barely able to get in the room together. Busy promoting solo ventures and engaging in self-destruction, what emerged is a patchwork quilt of an album. Nicks' and Fleetwood's drug habits were spinning out of control, and Buckingham had one foot out the door before it even began. Afterwards, he called recording the album “the worst experience of [his] life” and refused to tour with it. Even so, it's the second most successful Fleetwood Mac album after Rumours and gave the generation-defining anthem “Everywhere”, penned by Christina McVie. 

Buckingham left the group after Tango in the Night, but Fleetwood Mac has never really been able to give up on each other. Some version of the line-up has always existed in some kind of omnipresent way, with members dipping in and out of tours, though Christine McVie sadly passed away in 2022 at the age of 79. 

Fleetwood Mac had enough implosive chaos to power a small town if harnessed, and used it to make music that, still to this day, has no risk of ever fading out of public consciousness or artistic inspiration.