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Three years have passed since Fleetwood Mac’s last tour, but their performance at Consol Energy Center last night proved their on-stage spark is hardly exhausted. For about two and a half hours, the band sent the crowd on a nostalgic journey through their back catalog with many of their greatest hits, as well as a long lost demo and a new track from their upcoming EP. While the band as a whole put on a great show, the musical chemistry between Lindsey Buckingham and Stevie Nicks could not be ignored.

“Second Hand News” opened up the show, presenting Buckingham’s awe-inspiring fingerpicking skills almost immediately. As soon as the last chord sounded, Mick Fleetwood, seated atop an impressively large drum kit, rattled his shimmering chimes and broke into “The Chain.” John McVie’s dark, ominous bass solo hypnotized the squealing audience. Both songs set the tone for the evening: the Mac is back.

After “Dreams,” Buckingham took to the mic to discuss Fleetwood Mac’s return to the road.

“Every time we go apart and come back together, it’s different,” he said. “There are some chapters left to write for Fleetwood Mac.”

With that, the band performed “Sad Angel,” a new song from their next release. Much like many other Fleetwood Mac favorites, the song was upbeat with Buckingham’s fingerpicking driving the song.

Most of the set list seemed to focus on Buckingham’s talent as a guitarist, especially during his solo acoustic performance of “Big Love,” during which he thrashed and smacked his strings. Nicks’ vocals and theatrics also took center stage, specifically during “Rhiannon” and “Sara.” “Landslide” and “Never Going Back Again,” both performed acoustically by the duo, drew even more attention to them, as though the rest of the band hardly existed.

Buckingham gave a brief speech about a business axiom before tearing into two songs from Tusk. He explained the phrase, “If it works, run it into the ground and move on,” reminds him of that album, which shocked Warner Brothers quite a bit.

“It was not what they ever expected and most probably not what they wanted.”

“Not That Funny” allowed Buckingham to get more aggressive with his vocals, while he turned “Tusk” into a chaotic, barbaric chant. He crept up to the microphone like a jungle cat, building the song with increasingly louder coyote-like yelps. Fleetwood’s drum solo further established the savage manner of the song.

In addition to playing old favorites, Nicks and Buckingham performed a song they had recorded as a demo in the 1970s and lost somewhere along the way of their rise to fame.

“It was before we were even doing drugs. We were sober, and we still lost it!” Nicks said.

The song, entitled “Without You,” was a ballad written by Nicks about Buckingham. They rediscovered it on YouTube recently and have been performing it throughout their tour. Fleetwood moved off of his platform and in between Nicks and Buckingham, making the song seem even more intimate, as though the trio were reliving a moment from the start of their career together.

“Gypsy” and “Eyes of the World” had the crowd singing, while Nicks’ performance of “Gold Dust Woman” turned into a haunting, theatrical performance. She writhed around in a gold outfit, like the melting Wicked Witch of the West. Buckingham countered Nicks’ dramatics with his evocative rendition of “I’m So Afraid.” He thrashed and smacked his guitar strings like a man gone mad, creeping across the stage with a slow skip.

“Stand Back” and “Go Your Own Way” livened up the audience after Nicks and Buckingham’s bizarre performances. “World Turning” included an appropriately over-the-top solo from Fleetwood, with him screaming “Are you still with me?” in between his flurried drum rolls.

The band left the stage, only to return with a rousing performance of “Don’t Stop.” Brett Tuggle’s piano solo stole the show. The band left and returned to the stage once more for a poignant performance of “Silver Spring.”

As the band bid the audience farewell one last time, Nicks showed her gratitude for their fans, dubbing them “the dream catchers.”

“This whole thing is all your fault. You did it,” Nicks said as she thanked the crowd for their support over the years.

Fleetwood, donning a red top hat, red shoes, and knickers, gleefully trotted to the microphone to also show his graciousness.

“We are glad to be back doing what we love to do,” he said.

And with a tip of his hat, the ringleader exclaimed a prophetic message.

“Remember…the Mac is back!”

Here's a new cool thing: The Andy Warhol Museum, which hosts plenty of up-and-coming acts and well-respected musicians alike as part of its Sound Series, is now offering what it calls the Silver Studio Sessions: video performances by Sound Series artists, available on its website.

Here's a sample, from The Magnetic Fields' Stephin Merrit's session:

Check the whole series — with songs by Dean & Britta and Valgeir Sigurðsson and Nadia Sirota — out here.

Jasiri X couldn’t have come up with a better title to describe his new album, Ascension. While at the core the album remains consistent with the path that he’s taken to this point, calling out and taking action against corruption in politics and society, Jasiri mixes in some of the raw elements of hip-hop that have influenced his rap career. On “42 Bar Thesis,” you’ll find him lyrically attacking fraudulent rappers, while on “Warrior,” he reflects on his rise in the ranks of hip-hop. The album features fellow conscious rappers Brother Ali and Rhymefest. We spoke with him about the new record.

This being your most anticipated release to date, and you having been on tour pretty much since its release, what has the response been?
I’ve been getting a great response, nothing but love. We did a show with Ab-Soul and Dead Prez and got a tremendous amount of love. I’ve been in the Bay Area, actually, since the 29th [of March]. I’ve spoken at middle schools, high schools, colleges, panels, performances. So, yeah it’s been love.

One of my favorite joints on the new album is “Intro (He Shot Satan).” The concept of the song and the way you end it on the lyric saying “I hope they write my history like ‘remember he shot Satan’” is super dope. Can you take me through the thought process and writing process when you came up with that song?

It was the last song that I wrote for the project. It was really, like, me coming up saying this project is finally here. And that’s why [in the song] I say “what does it mean when you see a thing in a dream and bring it into existence, see it through to fruition.” It was more so, like, me just talking about and taking you through my feelings in terms of the type of artist I am. You know, in the hood it’s like, you tell stories about people like ‘Yo, you remember when so-and-so, like, knocked out homeboy,’ you know what I mean. So, that was me saying that I hope they write my history like ‘Yo, remember he shot Satan?’ More so, like, remember I was somebody that’s coming with something contrary to a normal industry thing. I hope to be remembered as somebody that was kind of on the side of good and right, and not for, like, what’s currently being packaged and sold as the culture of hip-hop.

Your song “42 Bar Thesis” opens with comments about you being in the studio with a lot of legends and flying over seas. Who have you been working with and what’s the feeling been as you’ve began touring various parts of the world?
Brother J, Wise Intelligent, I did a song with Arrested Development that hasn’t come out yet. Chuck D is somebody that’s embraced me and mentored me. It’s like, "wow." I’m building and doing songs with these guys, like M-1 of Dead Prez, Brother Ali. It’s like seeing yourself at one moment on the local level struggling to get known and then next thing you know I’m hanging with Talib, and Lupe, and hanging with M-1 and Dead Prez. And then it’s like, "Oh yeah, that’s Jasiri, that’s one of the new dudes on the scene that we’ve passed the baton to."
In the first verse of that song I say ‘My life’s a whirlwind/picture in the paper, I read it on the plane to Berlin.’ When I was flying to Berlin, Germany - I did a week out there, I was part of a conference and also did some shows — Pittsburgh Post-Gazette had done a story on, like, me, Wiz, Mac, Formula 412, and I think maybe Boaz. They had all of our pictures kind of together with articles about us. And literally I bought that paper the day that I was flying to Berlin. So that’s when I’m like, "Yo, watchu gon’ tell me now?! You know what I mean." (laughs)
I’m in the paper and I’m getting on the plane to go to Berlin, Germany. Right when I came back is when I left my job and began to do it full-time. So now I’m like, yo, feeling like a rap star with my name on the shirt, that’s how I felt at that moment.

You’ve been involved with hip-hop since the mid-90s. What was it like to make it to the point where you were able to quit your job to do this as a career? To take that leap there’s risk involved, but it’s obviously what you love. What was the feeling at that time?
It was a risk. I remember even when I left, it was just … the sad part was that it had nothing to do with how I was doing my job, it was the politics of the board of education and I was kind of targeted to be let go. You know, they gotta go through their vaccinations because it’s a union. I really should’ve let them fire me, but I didn’t, I just came in one day, handed them the keys and was like, "I’m out."
But, I remember getting that last check and realizing, like, ain’t no more direct deposit. I gotta go all-in and go hard. So, there was a moment of fear. But I remember a year after I quit doing the taxes and realizing that I made twice as much on my own than I did at that job, and being like ‘yo, damn!’ Cause in the midst of it I didn’t really realize it. So yeah man, there’s no greater feeling than being able to, you know… I was able to say ‘I’m gonna be out in the Bay for a week and a half,’ then I go to Seattle, then I go to Dayton, Ohio. So, I’m able to take two weeks and go to promote my album and I’m able to do that and have the resources and the funds to do that. There’s nothing better than being able to wake up where you wanna wake up and do what you wanna do, especially if it’s something that you love.

On “The Unmasking,” in a story of you searching for yourself, how closely related is the storyline of that song to what your reality has been?
Oh, that is my reality. That’s probably the most personal song that I’ve done. When I started writing the album, I put a little blog out there because I was going through some serious changes. Really, “The Unmasking” is a clearer picture of what was happening in my life at the time. They said I was buzzing, so I’m starting to feel myself a little bit, you know what I’m saying, cause I had this online buzz. It was weird, because I never had that experience. So I started to feel myself, and I started to really act in a way and make decisions in a way that wasn’t me, you know what I’m saying. Because I was having this “success,” I ended up going off-line for three months, man, and kind of just getting back to myself and my real life, trying to put everything in perspective. But, that was very real for me. And that song is a 100 percent real story of kind of that trial I went through at that time, like I said feeling myself and then making decisions that weren’t coinciding with what I was rhyming about or supposed to be living.

Jasiri X is scheduled to return from his tour later this month. His new album, Ascension, is available for purchase on iTunes and physical copies will be available in the coming weeks. You can stay updated on the latest with Jasiri X on Facebook and Twitter.