It was a quarter of a century ago when Bill Clinton took Fleetwood Mac’s “Don’t Stop (Thinking About Tomorrow)” as his campaign song. It was a brilliant move, although for a while the song suffered from the association and wasn’t played on the radio so much.
So tonight it was only fitting that Clinton showed up to present Fleetwood Mac with their Person of the Year award from MusiCares, one of the Grammy Award charities. After a night songs from other stars and from the Mac themselves, Clinton made a special appearance at Radio City Music Hall to hand Mick Fleetwood, John McVie, Christine McVie, Stevie Nicks and Lindsay Buckingham their awards.
Clinton revealed that in 1991 a 19 year old driver in Los Angeles flipped a cassette in the car radio and played Dont Stop for him. “This should be your campaign song.” That’s how it happened.
Clinton said he owed so much to Fleetwood Mac he had to be here.He brought a date too: Hillary.
The former President was preceded by performances featuring Miley Cyrus, Jared Leto, Little Big Town, Brandi Carlisle, Alison Kraus and Jerry Douglas, Imagine Dragons, and so on. After Clinton spoke and each member of Fleetwood Mac spoke, the group took the stage and played a half dozen or so hits including “The Chain,” with Harry Styles as guest star.
It was a different kind of night for MusiCares, which usually puts on its whole event– a big gala dinner and the concert– all in one spot at the LA Convention Center. But with no comparable venue in New York, they decided to have a proper concert at Radio City followed by a buffet at the New York Hilton in a ballroom. Even with the changes. they raised $7 million for indigent musicians and/or those needing help with housing and health issues.
PS at the live auction, someone paid $170,000 for a boxed signed set of lyrics from the “Rumours” album.
