Stevie Nicks and Christine McVie Clapped Back at an Interviewer’s Sexist Question: ‘We Were the Innovators’

Stevie Nicks and Christine McVie bonded over being the only women in the rock ’n’ roll band Fleetwood Mac. They once clapped back at an interviewer who asked a sexist question about their role in the group. Here’s what the interviewer asked and how Nicks and McVie responded. 

Stevie Nicks and Christine McVie defied gender roles as women in a rock band

Christine McVie and Stevie Nicks became close friends while working together in the band Fleetwood Mac. They bonded over being among the few women in the male-dominated rock music industry. In an October 2020 interview with CBS, Nicks shared that she and McVie made a pact early in their careers to stand up against sexism.

“We made a pact at the very beginning,” Nicks said, “That if we were ever in a room of super famous guitar players that didn’t treat us with the respect that we thought that we deserved, that we would just stand up and say, ‘This party’s over,’ and we would walk out.”

McVie and Nicks have been questioned many times about their decision not to have children, while all of their male bandmates had kids. 

“There was always a career in the way,” McVie told The Guardian in 2013. “It was a case of one or the other, and Stevie would say the same. The lads went off and had children but for Stevie and I it was a bit difficult to do that. So that was never able to happen. And I never found the right man. Not through want of trying.”

She added, “It would certainly be difficult for a chap to swallow if his wife or girlfriend is dashing off without being at home to cook his supper for him.”

Stevie Nicks and Christine McVie clapped back at an interviewer who asked a sexist question

In a 1977 interview with Lindsey Buckingham, Stevie Nicks, and Christine McVie, the women of Fleetwood Mac shut down an interviewer who asked a sexist question. 

Buckingham explained how he and Stevie Nicks came to join Fleetwood Mac, years after McVie had already been in the band. The interviewer asked him, “It must have been one of the first bands to incorporate ladies and use them as such. Any problems as far as credibility of ladies in rock ’n’ roll when the band first hit the road with the girls?”

Buckingham frowned and started to say, “I don’t think so,” turning to Nicks and McVie.

“Well, I’d already been in the band for a good while, as a lady, and as a musician,” McVie pointed out as Nicks laughed. “I’d been primarily a musician rather than a backup singer, in any case. And then when Stevie joined the band, she was also a frontline singer and writer.”

She continued, “And I think in that way, I guess, we were the innovators of that kind of thing because it was more or less to my knowledge prior to us girls would be in rock bands, but would be backup singers and… ”

“Pretty faces,” interrupted the interviewer.

Nicks also defended herself against the sexist remark. “I think it comes down to the fact that Fleetwood Mac would not go on without Chris and me,” she said. “If we were sick, or something. Whereas in most bands with a girl in it, could go ahead and go, would go on and play. But they’d have trouble without us.”

Fans loved the women’s response to the sexist question

Fleetwood Mac fans noticed the interviewer’s sexist question and praised how Christine McVie and Stevie Nicks responded. They left supportive messages in the comments section of the YouTube video showing the interview.

“I love the fact that Christine put the reporter into place by making his reference to them as being ladies and musicians instead of girls just being backup singers,” one fan wrote in a comment that has garnered nearly 250 likes. “These two are hugely different and recognized.”

“I liked her answer too,” another fan replied. “Plus, there were plenty of other female led bands prior to Fleetwood Mac. It’s an absurdly sexist and ignorant question.”

Another fan noted Lindsey Buckingham’s reaction. “Also, I love how Lindsey turned to the women and was like ‘Why don’t you both give your actual take on this.’ He knew. He knew this was a dumb question. They literally MADE the band.”