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FLEETWOOD MAC - 2025 THE SONGS OF DANNY KIRWAN.
Personnel:
Danny Kirwan - vocals, guitar
Peter Green - vocals, guitar
John McVie - bass
Mick Fleetwood - drums
Fleetwood Mac Celebrates Danny Kirwan with New Compilation Album
Like Crying: The Songs of Danny Kirwan
Released Digitally May 16, 2025 | Warner Records
The Story:
Danny Kirwan (13 May 1950 – 8 June 2018) was a guitarist,
singer and songwriter with Fleetwood Mac from 1968 to 1972 At the age of 18.
as a third guitarist/vocalist given that Jeremy Spencer was persistently unwilling to play on songs written by Peter Green.
Kirwan found his feet quickly. His instrumental Jigsaw Puzzle Blues, appeared on the b-side of the UK No 1 hit Albatross
and had three vocal numbers featured on the US only compilation English Rose.
He appeared on the Blues Jam at Chess album recorded with blues musicians in Chicago and was surprised
to be offered half of the album Then Play On.
This featured his One Sunny Day and Without You both of which had previously appeared on English Rose,
When You Say, later covered by Christine McVie
on her first solo album, My Dream, an instrumental, and Like Crying, early demos of which
had been recorded for Blue Horizon.
His Coming Your Way was chosen to open the album and Although the Sun is Shining was an early example of the mellower direction
Kirwan would lead Fleetwood Mac in for a while. Around this time he and Mick Fleetwood
would appear on the first Tramp album along with original Mac bassist Bob Brunning.
He also played along with Fleetwood and John McVie on Jeremy Spencer's self-titled solo album (1970).
With the sudden departure of Peter Green in 1970, Kirwan suddenly found himself thrust out
front with Jeremy Spencer.
The resulting album, Kiln House, featured two songs written or co-written by Kirwan that would become live favourites in Station Man
and Tell Me All the Things You Do as well as another instrumental, Earl Gray.
Shortly afterwards, the band's first post-Green single was released featuring Kirwan's setting of the W H Davies poem Dragonfly backed with The Purple Dancer.
Kirwan survived further personnel changes in the addition of Christine McVie to the line-up and the unexpected departure
of Jeremy Spencer to join the Children of God. He would share singing and writing duties
with Christine and Spencer's replacement
Bob Welch on Future Games (1971) and its follow-up Bare Trees (1972) but the pressures of trying to return the band to mainstream success without Peter Green proved too much for Kirwan.
The pressure increased to the point where one night prior to a show in 1972 he smashed his guitar against a dressing room mirror
and refused to go onstage with the band. Danny Kirwan was sacked from Fleetwood Mac as a result.
After leaving Fleetwood Mac, Kirwan briefly resurfaced in a band called Hungry Fighter in which his short-lived successor Dave Walker was frontman but this broke up after one gig.
Under the guidance of his (and formerly Fleetwood Mac's) manager Clifford Davis, Kirwan released his first solo album Second Chapter in 1975.
It was not promoted with a tour and did not chart but was quickly followed by Midnight in San Juan (1976).
A long silence followed before the release of Hello There Big Boy in 1979 but by then Kirwan was contributing less in terms of guitar work and composition. Within a year, Mick Fleetwood documented having seen him a shadow of his former self and homeless.
Kirwan would never work in music again.
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