Never Make Me Cry

Work on "Never Make Me Cry" began in February 1979, although McVie wrote the song several months earlier on Dennis Wilson's boat.{{Cite book |last1=Caillat |first1=Ken |title=Get Tusked: The Inside Story of Fleetwood Mac's Most Anticipated Album |last2=Rojas |first2=Hernan |publisher=Backbeat Books |year=2019 |isbn=978-1-4930-5983-6 |location=Guilford, Connecticut|pages=199–201}} McVie later confirmed that she wrote the song about her romantic relationship with Wilson.{{Cite web |last=Hasted|first=Nick |date=23 June 2022 |title=Drugs, alcohol and goofing around: The making of Fleetwood Mac's Mirage |url=https://www.loudersound.com/features/fleetwood-macs-mirage-the-making-of |access-date=6 December 2024 |website=Louder |language=en}} For the February 1979 recording sessions, Ken Caillat and Richard Dashut, who served as the producers for Tusk, positioned a Yamaha grand piano in the middle of the recording space and miked the room before McVie's arrival. Hernan Rojas, who engineered the sessions, remembered that it was difficult to settle on a proper tempo, but they ultimately settled on 77 BPM.

McVie played through the song several times on a grand piano and worked out an introduction and ascending melodic pattern that led into the third verse. After some run-throughs with Buckingham strumming an acoustic guitar, three takes were required to achieve satisfactory piano and guitar tracks. McVie recorded a scratch vocal separately from the piano so that she could primarily focus on her singing. After this, Buckingham doubled his guitar strums and John McVie added some bass guitar. Originally, the song featured parts on a Hammond organ and a Chamberlin during the bridge, although these instruments were removed in favor of a nylon string guitar and some cymbals, the latter of which was played by Mick Fleetwood. The cymbals replaced the claves and timpani that he previously recorded.

Although originally conceived as a piano ballad akin to "Songbird", Buckingham conducted a significant overhaul on the song several months later, scrapping all of the keyboards in favor of nine electric guitar tracks primarily played on his Fender Stratocaster. The guitars were sent through Caillat's Fat Box to boost the output of the instrument, which was sent into the mixing console; another line was sent through a Fender Twin amplifier in an isolation room. Caillat, Dashut and Rojas applied reverb amongst other effects to the guitars, which according to Rojas, created the impression of a "sun-shimmering seabed." Buckingham thought that the song could have worked well with a groove, but held off on this idea out of deference to McVie.{{Cite AV media notes |title=Tusk (2015 Remastered) |title-link=Tusk_(album) |others=Fleetwood Mac |year=2016 |first=Jim |last=Irvin |page=16 |type=Liner Notes |publisher=Warner Bros. Records Inc. |id=Publisher Warner Bros #2HS-3350 |location=Los Angeles}}

The final lead vocal take was not recorded until July to avoid some of the consequences associated with colder weather, namely nasal congestion. During this recording session, Rojas said that McVie was in good spirits because Dennis Wilson had created a rose shaped garden for her birthday. McVie later said of the incident that "he had all these people holding a candle around the edge of it, slowly sinking into the mud. Then he got up on the balcony and proposed to me. Then he sent me the bill for the work. I suppose his heart was in the right place."{{Cite news |last=Hodgkinson |first=Will |date=18 June 2004 |title=Surviving the Fleetwoods |url=https://www.theguardian.com/music/2004/jun/18/1 |access-date=11 February 2024 |work=The Guardian |language=en-GB |issn=0261-3077}} The producers wanted McVie to deliver the song with maximum emotion, so she recorded her lead vocal five times from start to finish without any cuts or punch-ins.

Contemporary music critics only briefly mentioned "Never Make Me Cry" in reviews for Tusk. Ed Harrison of Billboard thought that the song's "minimal orchestration shows off McVie's vocal range."{{Cite magazine |last=Harrison |first=Ed |date=27 October 1979|title=Closeup |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=xyQEAAAAMBAJ&q=Fleetwood+Mac+Never+Make+Me+Cry+Tusk&pg=PT105 |access-date=10 February 2024 |magazine=Billboard |pages=90}} Writing for the Hartford Courant, Henry McNulty said that the song had "the elegant simplicity that made 'Songbird' such an elegant treat on the Rumours LP."{{Cite news |last=McNulty |first=Henry |date=4 November 1979 |title=Mac's Tusk Flawed, But Worthy |url=https://www.newspapers.com/article/hartford-courant-macs-tusk-flawed-but/170188831/ |access-date=18 April 2025 |work=Hartford Courant |page=5F |via=Newspapers.com}} Robert Hilburn of Los Angeles Times thought that several of McVie's compositions, including "Never Make Me Cry", benefited from "ore tailored arrangements."{{Cite newspaper |last=Hilburn |first=Robert |date=14 October 1979 |title=Tusk Shows Fleetwood Mac's Artistry is More than a Rumour |url=http://bla.fleetwoodmac.net/index.php?page=index_v2&id=892&c=18 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151230221150/http://bla.fleetwoodmac.net/index.php?page=index_v2&id=892&c=18 |archive-date=30 December 2015 |work=Los Angeles Times |access-date=10 February 2024 |via=The Blue Letter Archives}} Retrospective reviews have remained mostly positive, with PopMatters identifying the song as one of the album's "emotional centerpieces", although they were critical of the "unpleasant" echo on McVie's voice.{{cite magazine | last=Soto | first=Alfred | url=http://www.popmatters.com/feature/121168-christine-mcvies-warm-ways/ |title=Christine McVie's Warm Ways | magazine=PopMatters | date=March 9, 2010 | access-date=10 February 2024}} Writing for Record Collector, Kris Needs identified "Never Make Me Cry" as a "gorgeous" song that "stood the test of time".{{Cite magazine |last=Needs |first=Kris |author-link=Kris Needs |date=6 January 2016 |title=Tusk (Deluxe Edition) |magazine=Record Collector |url=https://recordcollectormag.com/reviews/album/tusk-deluxe-edition |access-date=30 December 2024 |issue=449 |language=en}}

Following McVie's death in 2022, several publications have listed "Never Make Cry" as one of McVie's best songs. Lindsay Zoladz of The New York Times labeled the song as an "underappreciated gem buried on the C side of Tusk that "places McVie's angelic voice front and center."{{Cite web |last=Zoladz |first=Lindsay |date=30 November 2022 |title=Christine McVie's 12 Essential Songs |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/30/arts/music/christine-mcvie-fleetwood-mac-songs.html |access-date=10 February 2024 |website=The New York Times}} Gwen Ihnat of Entertainment Weekly called the song a "beautiful, near-a cappella McVie showcase that underlines her eternal, emotional strength."

{{Cite web |last=Ihnat |first=Gwen |date=8 December 2022 |title=12 essential Christine McVie songs |url=https://ew.com/music/essential-christine-mcvie-songs/ |access-date=10 February 2024 |website=EW.com |language=en}} Rob Sheffield of Rolling Stone called the piano demo of "Never Make Me Cry" "one of her mightiest heartbreakers." He further noted the contrast between the delivery of the "defiant and victorious" first chorus and the end of the song, where her "refusal to cry" is the "saddest part" of the song.{{Cite magazine |last=Sheffield |first=Rob |date=1 December 2022|title=Farewell, Christine McVie, the Songbird Who Knew the Score |url=https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-features/christine-mcvie-fleetwood-mac-tribute-greatest-songs-1234639376/ |access-date=10 February 2024 |magazine=Rolling Stone |language=en-US}}

• Christine McVie – vocals
• Mick Fleetwood – cymbals
• John McVie – bass guitar
• Lindsey Buckingham – guitars

{{reflist}}

{{Fleetwood Mac}}

Category:1979 songs

Category:Fleetwood Mac songs

Category:Songs written by Christine McVie