Then Play On

Then Play On
Studio album by
Fleetwood Mac
Released19 September 1969
Recorded1968–1969
StudioCBS and De Lane Lea, London[1]
Genre
Length53:39
LabelReprise
ProducerFleetwood Mac
Fleetwood Mac chronology
The Pious Bird of Good Omen
(1969) 		Then Play On
(1969) 		Fleetwood Mac in Chicago
(1969)
Singles from Then Play On
  1. "Rattlesnake Shake"
    Released: September 1969 (US)[2]
Professional ratings
Review scores
SourceRating
AllMusic[3]
Blender[4]
Encyclopedia of Popular Music[5]
Entertainment WeeklyA−[6]
The Rolling Stone Album Guide[7]

Then Play On is the third studio album by the British blues rock band Fleetwood Mac, released on 19 September 1969. It was the first of their original albums to feature Danny Kirwan (although two tracks recorded with him were included on the compilation album The Pious Bird of Good Omen released earlier in 1969) and the last with Peter Green. Although still an official band member at the time, Jeremy Spencer did not feature on the album apart from "a couple of piano things" (according to Mick Fleetwood in Q magazine in 1990).[8] The album offered a broader stylistic range than the straightforward electric blues of the group's first two albums, displaying elements of folk rock, hard rock, art rock and psychedelia. The album reached No. 6 on the UK Albums Chart, becoming the band's fourth Top 20 LP in a row, as well as their third album to reach the Top 10. The album's title, Then Play On, is taken from the opening line of William Shakespeare's play Twelfth Night—"If music be the food of love, play on".

Then Play On is Fleetwood Mac's first release with Reprise Records after being lured away from Blue Horizon and a one-off single with Immediate Records. The label would be the band's home until their self-titled 1975 album, after which they signed to Reprise's parent company Warner Records. The initial US release of the album omitted two tracks that were previously issued on the American compilation album English Rose, while the second US pressing further abridged the tracklist with the addition of the hit single "Oh Well". The original CD compiled all the songs from the two US LP versions, both of which omitted the English Rose tracks that are on the original UK version. In August 2013, a remastered edition of the album was reissued on vinyl and CD. This version includes all the tracks from all previous versions of the album, with the original 1969 UK track listing as the main album and both parts of "Oh Well", as well as the 1970 non-album single "The Green Manalishi (With the Two-Pronged Crown)" and its B-side "World in Harmony", as bonus tracks.

  1. ^ Unterberger, Richie (1 September 2016). Fleetwood Mac: The Complete Illustrated History. MBI Publishing Company. ISBN 9780760351765 – via Google Books.
  2. ^ Fleetwood, Mick (1993). My 25 years in Fleetwood Mac. Hyperion. p. 159. ISBN 0-297-81336-6.
  3. ^ "Then Play On – Fleetwood Mac | Songs, Reviews, Credits | AllMusic". AllMusic. Retrieved 18 May 2021.
  4. ^ "Blender :: guide". 19 October 2006. Archived from the original on 19 October 2006.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link)
  5. ^ Larkin, Colin (30 September 2013). The Virgin Encyclopedia of The Blues. Random House. ISBN 9781448132744 – via Google Books.
  6. ^ "Then Play On; Bare Trees; Fleetwood Mac; Rumours; Tusk; Time". Entertainment Weekly. 18 April 2003.
  7. ^ Brackett, Nathan; Hoard, Christian David (24 August 2017). The New Rolling Stone Album Guide. Simon and Schuster. ISBN 9780743201698 – via Google Books.
  8. ^ "Debauchery! How Fleetwood Mac Survived it – Q Magazine". Fleetwood Mac UK. Archived from the original on 17 August 2016. Retrieved 6 November 2023.