BUCKINGHAM AND BAND GET OUT ON THE ROAD
TOM PHALEN

The last time Lindsey Buckingham came through town, about August, he was promoting his third solo album Out of the Cradle. But he was talking about a dream band, the one with all the guitars.

"I got the band," Buckingham said brightly from Los Angeles recently. "It's working out really well." They will play the Moore Theatre tomorrow at 8 p.m.

Buckingham's latest release, despite critical acclaim, didn't set the charts on fire, even though he toured. It wasn't something he had to do. He's still making money from Fleetwood Mac, from the classic hits he wrote for the kazillion selling "Rumours" album.

He lives in a nice place in Bel Air that didn't slide away with the recent rains and has a fine self-contained recording studio. But he knew last summer it was time to get out again. That well-publicized side trip to D.C. for the inauguration was just that: a side trip.

"It's out of the way and they'll stop talking about it in another two or three years." End of story. The new story is the new band.

"When I first started putting it together we were auditioning bass and drums, like people from Don's (Henley) band. But after a week I thought, `This isn't working. If I want a guitar band, I have to get the guitars first.' We did that and everything else fell in place."

So who's in the band?

"Nobody you would know," he answered, laughing. "Is this a test? There's a lot of new people here . . . a lot of talent in Los Angeles that never gets tapped. For a lot of these people it's a first chance, first break. These people haven't had a chance to get jaded, which I like. I don't need that."

Buckingham took a breath. "We've got Steve Ross, an old friend of mine, on guitar; another guitarist Neal Haywood; two female guitarists, Liza Carbe and Janet Robin, who also do vocals; myself; and then on bass Kevin Wyatt; keyboards is Dan Garfield [Fleetwood Mac's 1990 tour]; and on percussion is Michael Tempo - you think that's his real name? - John Wackerman; and lastly Scott Breadman. Yeah, that's it."

Buckingham plans to hit 25 cities, with more, he hopes, in store.

"We're just trying to break through a barrier, get out and get heard. This band is taking on a life of its own, and I want to see where that goes. If this works, I'd like to take this group back to the studio.

"It'd be a lot easier that doing it all by myself again."