Watch David Gilmour Perform Fleetwood Mac’s ‘Albatross’ at Peter Green Tribute Show
The Mick Fleetwood & Friends tribute concert to Peter Green at London’s Palladium on February 20th, 2020 was packed with incredible performances from the likes of Pete Townshend, Noel Gallagher, Steven Tyler, Kirk Hammett, Billy Gibbons, and Christine McVie.
But one of the best performances came near the very end of the show when David Gilmour came out to play the 1968 Fleetwood Mac instrumental “Albatross.” You can check out the moment right here, and the entire concert will be available for streaming via Nugs on April 24th.
Fleetwood personally invited Gilmour to perform at the show even though he didn’t know him very well. “He had so much reverence for Peter Green’s playing and who Peter was and the songs,” Fleetwood told Rolling Stone earlier this year. “He initially got cold feet. He was like, ‘I don’t know if I can interpret Peter’s work. It’s so amazing. Maybe I can’t do that…At the moment I’m sort of passing on the idea. But later on, if this happens, I may gather enough courage.’”
When they spoke again a year and a half later, Gilmour agreed to give it a try. “He did beautiful work on the re-work of ‘Albatross’ with [former Fleetwood Mac guitarist] Rick Vito and also he did ‘Oh Well, Part Two’, which was on the Then Play On record,” Fleetwood said. “For lack of a better description, it’s a classical-esque escapade that Peter put together. Peter never played it. Fleetwood Mac never played it. That was really special that David picked that to do. I was overjoyed.”
The future of Fleetwood Mac remains a huge open question, though Fleetwood recently told us that he’s open to an idea of a reunion with Lindsey Buckingham. “I would love the elements [in the band] that are not healed to be healed,” he says. “I love the fantasy that we could cross that bridge and everyone could leave with creative, holistic energy, and everyone could be healed with grace and dignity.”
