This Day in Music History (10/12): Fleetwood Mac/Tusk

Tusk is the 12th album by the British/American rock band Fleetwood Mac. Released on this day in 1979, it is considered experimental, primarily due to Lindsey Buckingham's sparser songwriting arrangements and the influence of punk rock and new wave on his production techniques. Bassist John McVie has commented that the album sounds like "the work of three solo artists" (Buckingham, Stevie Nicks and Christine McVie), whilst Mick Fleetwood later proclaimed that it is his favourite and the best Fleetwood Mac studio album created by the group. Costing over $1 million to record, it was the most expensive rock album made up to that point.

Tusk peaked at #4 in the U.S., spent over five months within the top 40, and was certified double platinum for shipping two million copies. The album gave the group two U.S. top-ten hit singles. The Buckingham-penned title track (US #8/UK #6) was the first single released, and included the USC marching band as accompaniment. However, this song is also a fan favorite for the University of Alabama, whose mascot is "Big Al", an elephant.

The Stevie Nicks composition "Sara" reached #7 in the US and #37 in the UK. Further releases from the album, "Not That Funny" (UK only single release), "Think About Me" and "Sisters of the Moon" were less successful.

Though the album sold 4 million copies worldwide, and earned a Grammy nomination in 1981, to its art designers in the category "Best Album Package", in comparison to the huge sales of Rumours and the unprecedented recording expense, the band's record label deemed the project a failure, laying the blame squarely with Buckingham. Fleetwood, however, blames the album's relative failure on the RKO radio chain playing the album in its entirety prior to release, thus allowing mass home recording. In addition, Tusk was a double album, with a high list price of $15.98 ($2.00 more than other double albums).

In 2013, NME ranked Tusk at #445 in their list of The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time.

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