Fleetwood Mac Cancels Tour Dates After John McVie's Cancer Diagnosis

Fleetwood Mac doesn’t tour all that often, so anytime it happens, it’s a pretty special occurrence. Back in 2012, various members of the band noted the group would hit the road, and they’ve spent the last year touring across the U.S. and elsewhere and even putting together some brand new music. It’s been a dream for fans, but unfortunately, that dream will now be ending, after news broke that group member John McVie has been diagnosed with cancer.

Early on Sunday, Fleetwood Mac took to Facebook to announce the somber news. The group noted via a post that McVie has developed cancer and will be headed into treatment right away. Unfortunately, this means that Fleetwood Mac will be cutting its World Tour short rather than playing dates without founding band member McVie.

Fleetwood Mac recently finished up the European leg of the band’s tour and were heading to New Zealand and Australia to play a few dates. Fourteen dates in all were planned for this leg of the tour, but unfortunately, all of those dates are now defunct. Here’s part of the message the group posted concerning McVie’s illness and explaining the issue to fans.

"We are sorry to not be able to play these Australian and New Zealand dates. We hope our Australian and New Zealand fans as well as Fleetwood Mac fans everywhere will join us in wishing John and his family all the best.”

While it sucks to lose out on a night of great fun and good music, cancer isn’t something to be messed with. Usually if people say they need treatment immediately, they need treatment ASAP, and it would be hard to fault someone for putting their health and well-being first. Since we don’t know what the exact diagnoses is, yet, let’s just hope this is something that McVie will be able to overcome with time and treatment. It's only been a year since the group lost early band member Bob Welch, and it would be sad to see someone else go so quickly.

In the Facebook post, the group didn’t mention whether ticketholders will be reimbursed for the lost dates, but typically bands, venues, and labels aren’t heartless when this sort of thing happens. We’ll keep you posted on whether the dates will be reassigned or whether tickets will be reimbursed in the coming weeks. In the meantime, you can check out the brand new EP Fleetwood Mac put out just this past April. It’s called Extended Play, and it’s worth a listen. Additionally, keep McVie in your thoughts over the coming weeks.

Jessica Rawden
Managing Editor

Jessica Rawden is Managing Editor at CinemaBlend. She’s been kicking out news stories since 2007 and joined the full-time staff in 2014. She oversees news content, hiring and training for the site, and her areas of expertise include theme parks, rom-coms, Hallmark (particularly Christmas movie season), reality TV, celebrity interviews and primetime. She loves a good animated movie. Jessica has a Masters in Library Science degree from Indiana University, and used to be found behind a reference desk most definitely not shushing people. She now uses those skills in researching and tracking down information in very different ways.