Joining the ranks of books that plumb the depths of one venerated album is Alan Light's full-throated celebration Don't Stop: Why We (Still) Love Fleetwood Mac's Rumours, which asks a musical question: How the hell did the Mac do that?
As of 2023, Fleetwood Mac's Grammy-winning Rumours, which was released in 1977, was Spotify's most streamed album of the 20th century. Light, who has written a fleet of books with and about household-name musicians, lands on several reasons for the album's enduring success. There's the variety provided by three capable singer-songwriters, two of whom were women--a novelty on the 1970s rock scene. There's the allure of interpersonal band drama, which informs the songs' lyrics. There have also been regular Rumours boosts since its release, from Bill Clinton's use of "Don't Stop" as his 1992 presidential-campaign song to a skateboarding guy's viral 2020 TikTok featuring "Dreams."
Those Spotify listeners can't all be baby boomers. To find out why younger generations keep falling in love with Rumours, Light interviewed, among others, some 30 "post-millennials." While their arguments for Rumours don't depart radically from those of their elders, the younger interviewees put their own generational spins on the album's appeal (one says that the Rumours-era band dynamics recall "the Justin Bieber-Selena Gomez-Hailey Bieber triangle"). Don't Stop is a glorious medley of Rumours-related thoughts and trivia anchored by the down-and-dirty song-by-song assessment at the book's center. Light's affectionate homage is suited to both Rumours die-hards and the unconverted--presuming there are any out there. --Nell Beram, author and freelance writer