Nearly a year after Christine McVie tragically passed away following a stroke, Stevie Nicks announced Fleetwood Mac would not be touring again without the late bandmate. 

During a recent interview with Vulture, Nicks opened up about why Fleetwood Mac just can’t go on performing without McVie. “When Christine died, I felt like you can’t replace her,” Nicks explained. “You just can’t. Without her, what is it? You know what I mean?”

While describing McVie as her musical soulmate, Nicks stated she spent more time with the late musician than any of her other best friends outside of Fleetwood Mac. “Christine was my best friend. When I think about Taylor Swift’s song You’re on Your Own, Kid and the line ‘you always have been,’ it was like, that was Christine and I.”

Nicks also admitted that she didn’t have anyone else who would protect her as McVie did. That’s why she and the other Fleetwood Mac bandmates are not touring. “When she died, I figured we really can’t go any further with this. There’s no reason to.”

McVie first started performing with Fleetwood Mac in the mid-70s on keyboards as well as lead and backing vocals. She was with the group until 1998 and then took a hiatus until 2014. She then stayed as a bandmate until her death in November 2022. The last time the entire band performed together was in 2019, just before the COVID-19 pandemic. Along with the stroke, McVie had been battling metastatic cancer, but it is unknown where the disease’s primary origin was. 

Stevie Nicks Calls Late Fleetwood Mac Bandmate Christine McVie ‘The Pop Star’ 

As she continued talking about Christine McVie, Stevie Nicks described her Fleetwood Mac bandmate and best friend as “the pop star.” 

“She wrote all those really super pop hits,” Nicks recalled. “None of the rest of us could write those songs. What would happen is we’d have to take the songs out, like we did when she actually retired for 18 years. We couldn’t re-create those songs.” 

Following McVie’s sudden passing, Nicks took to her Instagram to reflect on the loss of her best friend. At that time, the vocalist said she didn’t know that McVie was even ill. “I wanted to be in London,” she wrote. “I wanted to go to London – but we were told to wait. So, since Saturday, one song has been swirling around in my head, over and over and over.”

Nicks shared the lyrics to Hallelujah by HAIM. She then added, “See you on the other side, My Love. Don’t forget me.”