Covers have followed – with so many different types of songs to choose from, how could they not? Punky bands have “What Makes You Think You’re the One.” Poppy ones have “Think About Me.” Touring groups have long known the title track is a crowd pleaser, and really fun to play. Indie stars like Animal Collective and the New Pornographers have spoken at length about their obsessions with the album. Over the years, that weird eccentricity has made Tusk arguably the “coolest” Fleetwood Mac record, particularly among musicians. The most negative the reviews really got was “weird” or “eccentric.” Writers were throwing around words like “brilliant,” “uncompromising,” and even “punk” (comparatively speaking). And though unrated, Rolling Stone‘s review of Tusk reads about as positive as their Rumours review two years earlier. Robert Christgau gave the album a B+ in Village Voice, saying, “A million bucks is what I call obsessive production, but for once it means something.” The New York Times praised it, though called it a little overstuffed. But they weren’t going to manage Rumours II even if they’d wanted to (they arguably tried with Mirage a few years later).Ĭritically, it wasn’t a failure either. The worst that can be said is that Tusk underperformed more than a more accessible follow-up might have underperformed. If it didn’t live up to Rumours’ insane success, well, no album was going to. But the four million it did sell more than made back that extravagant advance and, then as now, any double album that actually made a label money would be in the minority. True, none of the singles matched the success of “Dreams” or “Don’t Stop.” And true, in the end Tusk sold well under Rumours‘ 15 million copies. True, the label spent a then-record $1.4 million on Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours follow-up. But it didn’t actually fail at all.Ĭommercially, it wasn’t a failure. Tusk‘s reputation as an infamous failure is pretty much cemented at this point.
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