I've seldom done a gig without a spritzer, you know?" She smiles, acknowledging the Mac's status as doyens of debauchery. "But it wasn't anywhere near as bad as I thought. In fact, it felt great!"

Performing Don't Stop took on added poignancy for two reasons. First, it was discovered shortly after McVie's former husband John McVie, the Mac of the band's name and its bassist – about whom the song was written – had been diagnosed with cancer, although McVie says the "prognosis looks good" and the band expect him to be "up and running again in a couple of months" (they cancelled several Australian and New Zealand dates while he underwent treatment). Second, it seemed to trigger a realisation within McVie herself: she had previously seemed adamant thatleaving the band had been the right thing to do because she was sick of the music industry, panic attacks had made travelling impossible and she longed for the quiet life she had made for herself in a 17th-century mansion in Kent.



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In fact, so settled and reclusive had she seemed – the odd rare interview found her talking about cooking for friends, tending to her garden and looking after dogs – that when I ask if she would ever consider rejoining permanently, I'm taken aback by her answer: "If they were to ask me, I would probably be very delighted," she says, before explaining why she originally quit. "I think I was just musiced out at the time. I