Article: Stevie On Her Favourite Songs ("Mick told Lindsey..")

[strandinthewind]

Originally Posted by skcin

. . . I don't recall asking you for your interpretation of Gypsy.

You'll take what I give you and like it - capice

[michelej1]

Originally Posted by HejiraNYC

Robin didn't die until October(?) 1982, which was about six months after Mirage was released, so there is no way that the "bright eyes" lines were written about her.

Yah, but when was she diagnosed? Stevie had this whole song ready to go about her bed on the floor and paper flowers, which is really a concept that has remained vitally important to her for 3 decades now. Then, when she found out Robin was dying she didn't really have time to write a new song for her too, so she just threw in some bright eyes and went on about her business.

Stevie did say that the "lightning strikes maybe once, maybe twice" was about Robin too, that you only get a good friend like that once in your lifetime or twice if you search really hard.

Michele

[David]

Originally Posted by strandinthewind

I do not think it was Robin's actual death, but the process of dying that inspired those lines. I also think it is entirely possible that the line "I still see your bright eyes" was written before then about something else.

I agree with you, surprise surprise.

I think Stevie took that phrase from the Art Garfunkel song "Bright Eyes" from "Watership Down." You can hear Stevie talk about her love for this song in the radio interview with Garfunkel & Robert Klein in 1981. She even sings a little bit of it.

"I still see your bright eyes" I think appears in demos with Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers as far back as April 1980.

It's hard for me to believe that any of the final lyrics in "Gypsy" had much to do with the best friend's sickness -- maybe the best friend in general, but not the sickness, which wasn't diagnosed until late summer 1981, by which time "Gypsy" had undoubtedly been not only written but recorded (the band were in Paris much earlier in 1981). By the time it was clear that the friend's illness was going to result in her death within months (because of her decision to give birth), "Mirage" was on the shelves.

Also, there must be some sort of connection between the song & the 1978 UNICEF Year of the Child. Remember some of those early demos of it when Stevie sings "and the year of the child/is enough"? The year after that, the band sent proceeds from "Beautiful Child" on "Tusk" to UNICEF, which must have been Stevie's wish.

[TrueFaith77]

Originally Posted by strandinthewind

I think La Nicks looks at it like this - Robin was her friend before and after the fame. Robin was around during all that time. Stevie said that when she said that Robin was the one that knew the real Stevie, i.e. the one who put her bed on the floor, etc. So, Robin is, in a sense, part of the whole song. She is the one that can relate to La Nicks seeing her former innocent self dancing away from the star now - Robin is the one who had the memory that was left. Then, Robin dies and her (Stevie's) memory is all that is left of her (Robin and La Nicks' innocent self) now.

I think there is more in there, but that is my take on this one part.

Note - SOTM has this same Stevie as the normal person talking to Stevie the star kind of thing.

Finally, the words of Gypsy were, like most of her songs, likely taken from a number of unrelated journal entries written over a period of time that likely stretched into the 70's. In other words, the poem "Gypsy' likely was not written in her journals in one sitting. Rather, La Nicks likely went through her journals and pulled lines from things and assembled the poem, as she says she does to create most of her songs, to create the theme of the song. So, it is possible and rather likely that some of the lines do come from the 70's and were written then - it also is likely that while the final lines go together to meet the theme of the poem, their original meaning in the actual, likely unrelated, journal entries was different. Then, the "bright eyes" line was written later, but it connotes innocence and the death of it, which is the general theme of the song. I also think that the period of time of Robin's sickness and the realization that she would die was the spark that caused La Nicks to complete writing this song with the added lines. I think La Nicks saw this sad event as the end of an era, the loss of a part of her innocence, etc. So, the song is very much inspired by and written about Robin and La Nicks' relationship with Robin.

On edit - this is why she says that "line was about" this. And then says the song is about that.

I like your breakdown a lot!

[strandinthewind]

Originally Posted by TrueFaith77

I like your breakdown a lot!

Thanks!!!!

I think this complex nature and historical aspect of her writing (along with her personage, compelling voice, looks, and production (in this case LB and the Mac)) enables people to readily relate to her and her words. I mean Gypsy could relate to anything. A friend used it in a 9/11 memorial for a lost loved one. The whole lightening strikes, maybe once maybe twice was the planes slamming into the buildings. The "memory is all that is left of them now" (she changes this lyric every now and then) was the pictures of the deceased heroic fire fighters, the office workers that were killed, etc. I still see your bright eyes, bright eyes - can't find you - was played with the picture of the dead loved one. And, it totally worked, esp. with the urgency of and in La Nicks' voice. So, the broad appeal is evident, at least to these eyes.

On edit -- I wonder if her songs like Sara, which is equally broad and very mysterious, have such broad interpretive appeal?

[TrueFaith77]

Originally Posted by strandinthewind

Thanks!!!!

I think this complex nature and historical aspect of her writing (along with her personage, compelling voice, looks, and production (in this case LB and the Mac)) enables people to readily relate to her and her words. I mean Gypsy could relate to anything. A friend used it in a 9/11 memorial for a lost loved one. The whole lightening strikes, maybe once maybe twice was the planes slamming into the buildings. The "memory is all that is left of them now" (she changes this lyric every now and then) was the pictures of the deceased heroic fire fighters, the office workers that were killed, etc. I still see your bright eyes, bright eyes - can't find you - was played with the picture of the dead loved one. And, it totally worked, esp. with the urgency of and in La Nicks' voice. So, the broad appeal is evident, at least to these eyes.

On edit -- I wonder if her songs like Sara, which is equally broad and very mysterious, have such broad interpretive appeal?

A friend of yours or a friend of Stevie's?

That's fascinating, because in War of the Worlds, when Tom Cruise tells his daughter than lightning never strikes twice (and then "it" does!), that's one of many references to 9/11 in that film. But don't get me started on "lightning strikes twice"...