“Hypnotized” by Fleetwood Mac

Bob Welch wrote "Hypnotized" for Fleetwood Mac's 1973 album Mystery to Me, and it wound up stashed on the B-side of the "For Your Love" single, a strange fate for a track that has since been called the best thing on the record. It's a hazy, late-night creeper. Mick Fleetwood cut his triple-time drum part straight through with no overdubs, while Welch works jazzy fourth chords in a minor key over acoustic guitar and Christine McVie's electric keyboards, a Pianet among them.

The lyric drifts through hypnosis and dreams, with detours to Mexico and North Carolina, and Welch traced the eerie mood to living at Benifold, a Hampshire mansion he found spooky even in summer. Bob Weston's solo roams across the octaves, Martin Birch co-produced with the band, and Fleetwood reckoned the group harmonies here showed the sound that would become their trademark.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.