Pop Song 240 of 500 "Go your own way" Fleetwood Mac 1976

Pop Song 240 of 500 "Go your own way" Fleetwood Mac 1976

"Go Your Own Way" was written at a house the band rented in Florida between legs of their Fleetwood Mac Tour. Mick Fleetwood, the band's drummer, remembered that the house had a "distinctly bad vibe to it, as if it were haunted, which did nothing to help matters…". For the first song Buckingham wrote for Rumours, Buckingham picked up an electric guitar and chugged the chord progression. In what he described as "a stream of consciousness", he sang the opening line, "Loving you isn't the right thing to do". By 1976 the romantic relationship between Stevie Nicks and Lindsey Buckingham had come to an end. While Buckingham and Nicks were still on speaking terms, their conversations often devolved into yelling and screaming matches.

Inspired by the drum feel of "Street Fighting Man" by The Rolling Stones, Buckingham sought to incorporate a variation of the groove in "Go Your Own Way". On "Street Fighting Man", the drumbeat alternates between the tom-tom and the snare drum, which Buckingham wanted Fleetwood to play on "Go Your Own Way"'s verses. Ken Caillat, Fleetwood Mac's producer, took notice of Buckingham's enthusiasm as he demonstrated the drum part he envisioned to Fleetwood. "I remember watching him guide Mick (Fleetwood) as to what he wanted – he'd be so animated, like a little kid, playing these air tom fills with his curly hair flying. Mick wasn't so sure he could do what Lindsey wanted, but he did a great job, and the song took off." Fleetwood would ultimately come up with his own variation of the "Street Fighting Man" groove, where he played across the tom-toms while letting the bass drum play the middle beat.

Initially, John McVie tracked a busier, and bouncier bass part that gave the song "a country feel". To prevent the verses from becoming too bloated, Buckingham asked him to straight eighth notes along with the rhythm guitar. Buckingham granted McVie more artistic liberty on the choruses, which he opened up with a more melodic bass line. Additional overdubs of Hammond B3 organ, electric and acoustic guitars, layered backing vocals, and assorted percussion such as the bell of a cymbal and maracas were also added to the mix. The song follows an aeolian I-VI-VII descending chord progression.

The band had a difficult time assembling a suitable guitar solo, so Caillat, who was away in Lake Tahoe for Christmas vacation, was called to return to Criteria Studios to finish the track. Caillat built the solo by piecing together six different lead guitar takes. He accomplished this by pulling up individual guitar solos through faders, which he would mute after bringing up the next fader. Caillat found the solo "seamless" despite its fragmented nature. A Shure SM57 microphone was used to capture the guitar solo in addition to some vocal tracks.

In the final mix, the kick drum became too overpowering at the end of the song; it created a pumping effect together with the rhythm guitar from the dynamic range compression. Producer/engineer Richard Dashut argued that they would not have encountered this "lucky mistake" had they mixed the song digitally.

Lyrics
Like most tracks on Rumours, the lyrical content of "Go Your Own Way" documents personal strain in relationships between band members. Buckingham wrote "Go Your Own Way" as a response to his breakup with fellow Fleetwood Mac vocalist Stevie Nicks, whom he had known since he was 16 years old. "I was completely devastated when she took off," Buckingham noted. "And yet I had to make hits for her. I had to do a lot of things for her that I really didn't want to do. And yet I did them. So on one level I was a complete professional in rising above that, but there was a lot of pent-up frustration and anger towards Stevie in me for many years." Writing the song helped Buckingham come to terms with reality, despite his fallout with Nicks.

When Nicks heard the song, she demanded that Buckingham remove the line "Packing up, shacking up is all you wanna do", but he ultimately kept the lyrics. Nicks later explained her feelings about the line: "I very much resented him telling the world that 'packing up, shacking up' with different men was all I wanted to do," she told Rolling Stone. "He knew it wasn't true. It was just an angry thing that he said. Every time those words would come onstage, I wanted to go over and kill him. He knew it, so he really pushed my buttons through that. It was like, 'I'll make you suffer for leaving me.' And I did."