A Guide to Band Members Who Have Dated Each Other Over the Years: Paramore, Fleetwood Mac and More

Credit: Shutterstock (2)

A Guide to Band Members Who Have Dated Each Other Over the Years: Paramore, Fleetwood Mac and More

MFleetwood Mac is perhaps the most famous example of bandmates dating each other — and the ensuing complications that come with it. “I broke up with Lindsey [Buckingham] in 1976. We'd only been in Fleetwood Mac for a year and a half, and we were breaking up when we joined Fleetwood Mac," Stevie Nicks recalled in a February 2022 conversation with The New Yorker. "So, we just put our relationship kind of back together, because I was smart enough to know that, if we had broken up the second month of being in Fleetwood Mac, it would have blown the whole thing." Scroll through for a guide to which musicians have dated their bandmates over the years:

Credit: Shutterstock (2)

A Guide to Band Members Who Have Dated Each Other Over the Years: Paramore, Fleetwood Mac and More

MFleetwood Mac is perhaps the most famous example of bandmates dating each other — and the ensuing complications that come with it. “I broke up with Lindsey [Buckingham] in 1976. We'd only been in Fleetwood Mac for a year and a half, and we were breaking up when we joined Fleetwood Mac," Stevie Nicks recalled in a February 2022 conversation with The New Yorker. "So, we just put our relationship kind of back together, because I was smart enough to know that, if we had broken up the second month of being in Fleetwood Mac, it would have blown the whole thing." Scroll through for a guide to which musicians have dated their bandmates over the years:

Credit: Dave J Hogan/Dave J Hogan/Getty Images

Debbie Harry and Chris Stein

The Blondie bandmates dated from 1973 to 1987 and remained good friends after they split. Harry is the godmother of Stein’s two daughters, whom he shares with wife Barbara Sicuranza. 

“When I first met Debbie I just thought she was really fantastic, musically. I think I just saw what a lot of other people saw later on. She was very charismatic and beautiful and all that stuff,” Stein wrote in an essay he penned for The Big Issue in March 2020. 

Despite their strong bond, the pair’s relationship grew strained as they both tried to get sober. 

“Debbie and I had grown out of sync,” Stein wrote in his 2014 memoir, Under a Rock. “Maybe in part because of her going off methadone and me staying on it, maybe lots of stuff, but things ran their course and she moved out.”

Credit: Michael Putland/Getty Images

Benny Andersson and Anni-Frid ‘Frida’ Lyngstad

The ABBA bandmates were married from 1978 to 1981. They began dating shortly after meeting in 1969 and cofounded ABBA in 1972 along with Agnetha Fältskog and Björn Ulvaeus. ABBA split in 1982, one year after their divorce, but reunited from 2016 to 2022. 

Credit: Evening Standard/Hulton Archive/Getty images

Agnetha Fältskog and Björn Ulvaeus

The couple tied the knot in 1971, one year before the formation of ABBA. They went on to welcome daughter Linda in 1973 and son Peter in 1977 before divorcing in 1980, two years before ABBA broke up. The ABBA song “The Winner Takes It All,” cowritten by Ulvaeus and Andersson, was inspired by their split.

“Going through divorce is difficult as anyone would know who’s done it. That was of course taking up my thoughts. But there was not one winner in the case of us,” Ulvaeus said in the 2024 CW documentary ABBA: Against the Odds.

Fältskog added that the song later became too difficult to perform. 

"We could feel that the song had suddenly got a bit heavy. It was not so fun anymore to record,” she said. “There was something in the atmosphere. A bit tragic.”

Credit: Will Ragozzino/Getty Images

Kim Gordon and Thurston Moore

Gordon and Moore tied the knot in 1984, three years after they formed Sonic Youth with Lee Ranaldo. They welcomed daughter Coco in 1994. After 27 years of marriage, the duo announced their separation in 2011, at which point Sonic Youth disbanded. 

It was later revealed that Moore had an affair with book editor Eva Prinz. Although Gordon and Moore tried going to counseling, Moore ultimately wouldn’t end his relationship with Prinz.

"We never got to the point where we could just get rid of her so I could decide what I wanted to do. Thurston was carrying on this whole double life with her. He was really like a lost soul,” Gordon said during a 2013 interview with Elle. "We seemed to have a normal relationship inside of a crazy world. And in fact, it ended in a kind of normal way — midlife crisis, starstruck woman." 

Credit: Slaven Vlasic/Getty Images

Tina Weymouth and Chris Frantz

The duo met at the Rhode Island School of Design in the early 1970s. They later moved to New York City with David Byrne. After Byrne and Frantz were unable to find a bassist for their band Talking Heads, Weymouth learned the instrument and joined the group. 

Weymouth and Frantz tied the knot in 1977 and are together to this day. They share two children, Egan and Robin. 

“It’s something that you have to work at. You can’t take each other for granted,” Frantz told Ox Magazine of the pair’s connection in 2023. “You have to do nice things for each other and cheer each other up and try to make each other laugh. There’s a lot to be said for having a good sense of humor.”

Credit: Mediapunch/Shutterstock

Gwen Stefani and Tony Kanal

The Sweet Escape singer began dating her No Doubt bandmate shortly after he joined the group in 1987. Although the duo split in 1994, they remained friends and bandmates. The breakup inspired Stefani to write several of the songs on the 1995 album Tragic Kingdom, including “Don’t Speak.”

"We were on tour for Tragic Kingdom for 28 months. We were going through the breakup, and in every interview we were talking about it, so we were opening this wound on an hourly basis. It was so brutal, but I don't know how we made it through," the “Hollaback Girl” musician told The Guardian in September 2012. 

Credit: Dave Allocca/Starpix/Shutterstock

Jack White and Meg White

The White Stripes musicians were married from 1996 to 2000. Following their split, the rock duo went on to release five studio albums together before officially disbanding in 2011.

Early in the band’s tenure, Jack — who took Meg’s last name when they tied the knot — said that he and his bandmate were siblings rather than exes. 

"If we had presented ourselves in another fashion … how would we have been perceived, right off the bat? When you see a band that is two pieces, husband and wife, boyfriend and girlfriend, you think, 'Oh, I see.’ … When they're brother and sister, you go, 'Oh, that's interesting.' You care more about the music, not the relationship,” the guitarist told Rolling Stone in September 2005. 

Credit: AP/Shutterstock

Stevie Nicks and Lindsey Buckinham

Nicks and Buckingham were already an item when they joined Fleetwood Mac in 1975. Their split served as inspiration for the group’s 1977 album, Rumours. Nicks and Buckingham wrote “Dreams” and “Go Your Own Way” about each other for the LP, respectively.

“Both songs kind of mean the same thing — it's really about our breakup,” Nicks said. “He’s looking at it from a very unpleasant, angry way, and I'm saying, in my more airy-fairy way, ‘We're gonna be alright. We'll get through this.’"

Credit: Andre Csillag/Shutterstock

Christine McVie and John McVie

The other Fleetwood Mac couple, Christine and John, were married from 1968 to 1976. 

“I dare say, if I hadn’t joined Fleetwood Mac, we might still be together,” Christine told Rolling Stone in 1997. “I just think it’s impossible to work in the band with your spouse. Imagine the tension of living with someone 24 hours a day, on the road, in an already stressful situation, with the added negativity of too much alcohol.”

Credit: Gregory Pace/Shutterstock

Bruce Springsteen and Patti Scialfa

When Springsteen invited Scialfa to join his E Street Band on tour as a backup singer in 1984, he was still married to Julianne Phillips. Springsteen and Phillips separated in 1998, and the "Born in the U.S.A." musician began living with Scialfa soon afterward.

In a 1996 interview with The Advocate, Springsteen opened up about receiving backlash for starting a new relationship before his divorce was finalized.

“It’s a strange society that assumes it has the right to tell people whom they should love and whom they shouldn’t. But the truth is, I basically ignored the entire thing as much as I could. I said, ‘Well, all I know is this feels real, and maybe I have got a mess going [on] here in some fashion, but that’s life,’” he told the outlet at the time.

Springsteen married Scialfa in 1991. They share three children: Jessica, Evan and Sam.

Credit: MediaPunch/Shutterstock

Wyclef Jean and Lauryn Hill

Jean wrote about his love triangle with his Fugees bandmate Hill and his wife, Claudinette Jean, in his 2012 memoir, Purpose: An Immigrant’s Story. 

“Lauryn and I were pursuing a dream together, and that goal, as well as our mutual love of music, was the language that brought us together. And there was an attraction there; I’m not going to lie and act as if it was just because we spent time together that we ended up together. Lauryn’s beautiful, and because of her looks and her talent and everything we shared with each other — from songs to books to lyrics — love was bound to grow,” he wrote of Hill.

He added: “I was with both of these incredible women at the same time, which isn’t something to be proud of but it was definitely unavoidable. I couldn’t say no to either of them and I mean it when I say I loved them both, because I did.”

Despite his fling with the "Killing Me Softly" singer, the Haiti native and Claudinette have been married since 1994. They adopted a daughter in 2005. 

Credit: Suzanne Cordeiro/Shutterstock

Win Butler and Regine Chassagne

The Arcade Fire musicians met in college, becoming bandmates in 2001. They exchanged vows in 2003 and welcomed a son in 2013.

Credit: Owen Sweeney/Invision/AP/Shutterstock

Hayley Williams and Taylor York 

The Paramore band members confirmed that they are dating during a September 2022 interview with The Guardian. The duo have worked together since York joined the group in 2007.