“Green Shack” vocalist Gretchen Rhodes rekindles Fleetwood Mac’s blues classics. Sean M. Hower/Courtesy photo

A new tribute to classic Fleetwood Mac is being released featuring some Maui musicians led by Mick Fleetwood, with Gretchen Rhodes rocking on Mac gems like “Oh Well,” “Rattlesnake Shake” and “Black Magic Woman.”

Other Maui musicians on the “Green Shack” album include guitarist Joe Caro and keyboardist Mark Johnstone from the Island Rumours Band, and percussionist Tato Melgar from Lukas Nelson and Promise of the Real. On bass, there’s former David Bowie band member Carmine Rojas. It’s produced by Kerry Brown, who resides in Heulo, and has worked with many artists including Smashing Pumpkins, Miley Cyrus, Courtney Love and Ziggy Marley.

Pressed on limited-edition green vinyl, it’s been released on Brown’s Licorice Pizza Records label, which hosted the 2024 Sunflower Farm Music Festival on Maui.

One side of the record pays tribute to Fleetwood Mac’s Peter Green, while the other side honors Christine McVie with covers of her early rocking blues songs “Get Like You Used to Be,” “It’s OK With Me Baby” and “Woman Is the Blues.”

Singing with the Mick Fleetwood Island Rumours Band, Rhodes came up with the concept of the record some years ago.

“I’ve been seeing these songs with the band for 18 years,” Rhodes explains. “It was me basically wanting to pay homage to Peter Green, and I don’t know of any other woman that’s done these songs. Mick mentions it as well.”

It turns out that Rhodes’ version of “Black Magic Woman,” inspired Stevie Nicks to add it to Fleetwood Mac’s concert setlist.

“Stevie would come and listen to us at Fleetwood’s on Front Street,” Rhodes recalls. “I sang ‘Black Magic Woman,’ and after the show, I’m sitting beside her and across from us is Mick. And she’s like, ‘Mick, what made you have a woman sing the song?’ I was like, ‘That’s my idea.’ She looked at him, and ‘We should put that on our setlist for this next tour.’ Mick was like, ‘Yeah, totally.’

“Then later I get a call from Mick saying, ‘Do you have any recordings of yourself singing ‘Black Magic Woman,’ because Stevie wants to learn from that recording, and if you have the lyrics written out the way that you sing them, send those to us.’ So they ended up putting it on the setlist.”

When Rhodes caught Fleetwood Mac at a Kansas City show, she was surprised to get a shout out from Nicks.

“She’s on stage about to sing the song and she says, ‘I have to thank Gretchen Rhodes.

I wouldn’t be doing this if I hadn’t heard her sing it.’ That’s one of my greatest rock and roll stories.”

After approaching producer Kerry Brown with the Mac tribute idea, he arranged sessions at his Huelo studio. “It wouldn’t have happened if it weren’t for Kerry,” she notes.

As far as the McVie half of the album, Rhodes says, “I didn’t want to do the normal Christine McVie songs. This was going to be a blues album.”

Before McVie became famous as a member of Fleetwood Mac, she was part of the ’60s British blues boom, as Christine Perfect in the band Chicken Shack. McVie performed at the Maui Arts & Cultural Center with Fleetwood in 2013.

“I wanted to showcase this amazing woman who was a part of this blues band in 1967 with all these dudes, writing these blues songs and killing it,” says Rhodes. “I had never heard about Chicken Shack growing up. But these songs are really freaking cool. So I’m able to bring those back to life in order to pay homage to her in this way.”

“Green Shack” featuring Gretchen Rhodes and Mick Fleetwood is available on vinyl for pre-order. The digital single of “Black Magic Woman” was released on Oct. 29, Peter Green’s birthday.

The “Green Shack” album includes a number of musicians from Maui. Courtesy photo

The “Green Shack” album includes a number of musicians from Maui. Courtesy photo