Dragonfly (Fleetwood Mac song)

Content sourced from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.

Dragonfly is a Fleetwood Mac song written by Danny Kirwan, with lyrics taken from Welsh poet W. H. Davies’ 1927 poem “The Dragonfly” (the lyrics are rearranged and one verse is omitted).

Recorded in late 1970, Dragonfly was released in 1971 as the band’s first UK single after Peter Green left, and the first single with Christine McVie as an official member. By the time of release, guitarist Jeremy Spencer had also departed. Kirwan sang and played guitar, with Mick Fleetwood on drums and John McVie on bass. The B-side, “The Purple Dancer,” was co-written by Kirwan, Fleetwood Mac and McVie and featured Kirwan and Spencer on vocals; it was recorded in the same session.

Spencer did not take part in the Dragonfly recording, but both songs were performed live in late 1970 and early 1971 and can be found on bootlegs. Dragonfly was later performed on German TV Beat-Club in 1971 with Bob Welch replacing Spencer.

The song was recorded after the Kiln House sessions (Sept 1970). It was released as a single in the UK, Germany and the Netherlands, with special picture sleeves for Germany and the Netherlands; the British release used a plain sleeve. The single did not chart in these countries, adding to the band’s gloom on returning to Britain from America.

Christine McVie later said the period was difficult for the band. Dragonfly did not appear on the next album, Future Games, but it did appear on a 1971 Greatest Hits collection.

In 2014, a limited purple vinyl pressing of Dragonfly (with The Purple Dancer) was issued for Record Store Day, limited to 3,000 copies. It was also released on blue vinyl in the US, making Dragonfly available as a single there for the first time and it reached No. 9 on the US Hot Singles Sales chart.

Peter Green called it “the best thing he ever wrote.” Critics have praised Kirwan’s guitar work, and Mojo ranked Dragonfly No. 12 on its 2025 list of the 30 greatest Fleetwood Mac songs.