Mick's Money

[michelej1]

Fleetwood Mac: Drummer Mick can’t stop singing greenback blues after string of bankruptcies

OPINION — Annette Sharp The Daily Telegraph October 24, 201510:00AM Herald Sun

http://www.heraldsun.com.au/entertai...-1227580761518


WHEN you’re a musician pulling down the big bucks — even medium-sized ones — it seems it can be quite difficult to make sense of your finances.

This week your columnist scored a chat with visiting drummer Mick Fleetwood, the engine room and founder of British/American blues/rock phenomenon Fleetwood Mac.

At the height of the band’s fame, from 1977 to 1984, Fleetwood made a fortune with five huge albums that sold 55 million copies. Today that’s up to 100 million.

It’s hard to fathom how much money he made in that period — it was not as much as bandmates who wrote the music and collected royalties — but by 1984 Fleetwood was broke and declared bankrupt, listing $US2,404,430 in assets and $3,697,163 in debts to some 50 creditors.

His lawyer said Fleetwood’s problems were not due to rock ‘n’ roll excesses but: “Mick loves great drums, cars, beautiful women and (a) magnificent piece of real estate.”

He also loved cocaine.

In the early 1980s Fleetwood had been snapping up property in the belief that such property was a sound investment. He had spreads in Malibu, Hawaii, Beverly Hills, and a $1.9 million property, Wensley Dale, in Mit*tagong that Fleet*wood would later say had “probably started the whole crumbling effect”.

Australian law at the time, Fleetwood’s lawyer said, required that the mansion had to be paid for almost entirely in cash as Fleetwood was a foreigner. He lived in it for just three weeks before selling it.

He would go on to call his wild spending “the Chuck Berry Syndrome”, living from pay cheque to pay cheque.

Fleetwood is regarded as one of the best band managers in the world. It is because of his persistence and mediation of the fiery creatives in Fleetwood Mac — Stevie Nicks, John McVie, Lindsey Buckingham and Christine McVie — that the band is still around.

But financial management doesn’t come naturally to all. It didn’t for Fleetwood, who has gone bankrupt repeatedly since 1984 — so many times, in fact, he’s lost count.

“I’m like Donald Trump,” he told a British publication last year, hinting he may have been bankrupt seven times. “You pay off what debts you can. You do what you are told by your accountant. I really didn’t have much to do with it. I carried on like nothing had happened.”

With his third marriage coming to an end in 2013, Fleetwood and his band are touring again.

Rudimentary figures on the band’s 2015 tour have it that the current 49-city tour will be the second-highest grossing tour of the year, taking upwards of $92 million. The honour of top grossing tour of 2015 goes to One Direction ($107 million) and The Rolling Stones are third ($80.7 million). All of which means the tour has the potential to put* $10 million (with *merchandise sales) into 68-year-old Fleetwood’s pocket.

Our own Pete Murray is also learning poor finance management hurts.

This week it was revealed legal action Murray has been embroiled in for the past year remains unresolved, with Murray pursuing a former accountant whom he alleges paid himself $279,219 from the singer’s accounts without permission. The singer has taken Tony Lowe to court claiming he deducted money from his accounts from 2008 to 2014.

He is defending the matter.

The sum may seem small compared to the mega millions Fleetwood made and lost over decades (it stretches only to a car for 1980s Mick), yet in local terms it is a large sum.

Murray could find some inspiration in Fleetwood’s story. After 52 years in the business, Fleetwood has an estimated worth of $US8.5 million — way less than Mick Jagger on $US305 million and even Stevie Nicks on $US65 million.

Fleetwood’s plan is a simple one — not to retire.

[vivfox]

Originally Posted by michelej1

Fleetwood Mac: Drummer Mick can’t stop singing greenback blues after string of bankruptcies

But financial management doesn’t come naturally to all. It didn’t for Fleetwood, who has gone bankrupt repeatedly since 1984 — so many times, in fact, he’s lost count.

“I’m like Donald Trump,” he told a British publication last year, hinting he may have been bankrupt seven times. “You pay off what debts you can. You do what you are told by your accountant. I really didn’t have much to do with it. I carried on like nothing had happened.”

7 times???

[louielouie2000]

Originally Posted by michelej1

“Mick loves great drums, cars, beautiful women and (a) magnificent piece of real estate.”

He also loved cocaine.

This really made me chuckle.

I wonder when Mick's most recent bout of bankruptcy was?