Has Stevie's songwriting gone downhill?

[trackaghost]

A few people on the Rumours board were saying that they thought that Stevie hasn't written a decent song (bar Gyspy) since Bella Donna and any good tunes that she has released since then (ie Sorcerer, If You Ever Did Believe etc, etc) actually originated from the 1970s anyway.
There was also talk of Stevie only being as good as her producers, and not proving herself outside of what Lindsey does for her.

I personally love a good many records Stevie has written over the years that don't have their roots in the 1970s (Rooms On Fire, Blue Denim, Illume to name a few), and many of which I actually consider to be among her best.

I'm also fed up with Lindsey getting all the credit for Stevie's best songs. I've heard the demo for Sara and that was genius before Lindsey put his magic touch on it.

Can't we give Stevie some credit for being an amazing songwriter at long last?
What do you guys think?

[gldstwmn]

I think Stevie has written some great songs since the Rumours era. Rooms On Fire, Blue Denim, Juliet, Space Needle, Freedom and Trouble In Shangri La are, IMO great songs. In some cases, I think Stevie's various producers actually hindered the performance. Case in point: Smile At You. Exception to this rule: Jimmy Iovine. I think he was an excellent fit with Stevie's work. With two strong individuals, however, there was bound to be a breaking point.

[dissention]

I don't think Stevie's songwriting has gone downhill at all. I do think that in the eighties she put out a lot of *bad* stuff and in the nineties she put out the noise pollution that is Street Angel, but she's recovered very well in recent years. I mean, c'mon, the lyrics to the song TISL are among the BEST she has ever written; they're astounding. This sin't to say she hasn't put out some clunkers; she has and Not Make Believe can attest to that. But the good far outweigh the bad. I think it's ludicrous to say that she hasn't written anything great since '81. If a song like Doing the Best That I Can or Sable On Blonde came out in the seventies, the same people who say they don't think those songs are great would be saying they ARE great.

[Hippocampus]

I suppose it's going to be hard to find objectivity on this board :) but I don't think Stevie's writing has ever gone downhill.

The general consensus is that she had bad phases in her career but even during those times, I think there have always been great songs. And she's been writing consistently great tunes ever since Street Angel (Twisted, Sweet Girl, TISL album etc...).

[Siri Ruane]

Blue Denim, Fall From Grace, Everybody Finds Out, ect. DETAILS! If anything, she's gotten better. :cool:

[DeeGeMe]

I think Stevie's songwriting has "matured" over the years. I was blown away by some of the lyrics on TISL and I personally liked all of the new material on SYW. Sure, she's written some clunkers in her day, but what songwriter hasn't? She's prolific and when you write that many songs, there are bound to be some bad ones in the bunch. And isn't bad subjective? There are songs that I adore that I'm sure some of you Mac/Stevie fans out there hate, and some that I hate that you love.

[EveryHour]

Originally posted by DeeGeMe
I think Stevie's songwriting has "matured" over the years. I was blown away by some of the lyrics on TISL and I personally liked all of the new material on SYW. Sure, she's written some clunkers in her day, but what songwriter hasn't? She's prolific and when you write that many songs, there are bound to be some bad ones in the bunch. And isn't bad subjective? There are songs that I adore that I'm sure some of you Mac/Stevie fans out there hate, and some that I hate that you love.


AMEN!!!

I'm tired of people saying this song or that song is awful, terrible, sucks, etc., when it's really that they just don't care for it. It can actually be hurtful when Stevie means as much as she does to some of us. Whether a song moves you or not, she has clearly poured her heart into each and every one of them. I personally am a fan of all of those supposed "clunkers" (The Nightmare has grown to be one of my favorite songs on Rock A Little). I feel that most of the time with Stevie, you either 'get it' or you don't. Much of her music is not commercial or widely appealing, and no one should wish it was so. As a sidebar, I know that in general (not pertaining to Stevie songs) there are a lot of songs that I personally don't think are really GREAT songs, but it doesn't mean ya can't like them! (Admit it, you know what I mean!)
As far as her talent...most of her completely solo demos are chill-inducing, and I think that's all that needs to be said.

[Johnny Stew]

This is definitely a topic that causes a lot of debate!
Personally, I tend to prefer her current work.

Don't get me wrong, there's no denying the power of "Landslide," "Silver Springs," et al., but I've always been more interested in the now as opposed to the then.
I also tend to look more at Stevie's entire body of work, as opposed to an album-by-album basis.

I've enjoyed the growth and maturity in her lyrics over the years. And while some of the earlier songs might be a bit more relatable for the masses, there's an added depth in her recent material that really catches my fancy.

She's always written from the heart... she's always written very confessionally... and she's always written in a very unique way.
And she continues to do so to this day. :)

[Johnny Stew]

Originally posted by DeeGeMe
Sure, she's written some clunkers in her day, but what songwriter hasn't?I agree wholeheartedly.

As I've pointed out in the past, Stevie has released over 130 songs throughout her career, and truly only about a half-dozen of those can be considered out & out "stinkers" (though even then, it's a matter of opinion)... and that is not a bad batting-average at all!

[cliffdweller]

Originally posted by gldstwmn
I think Stevie has written some great songs since the Rumours era. Rooms On Fire, Blue Denim, Juliet, Space Needle, Freedom and Trouble In Shangri La are, IMO great songs. In some cases, I think Stevie's various producers actually hindered the performance. Case in point: Smile At You. Exception to this rule: Jimmy Iovine. I think he was an excellent fit with Stevie's work. With two strong individuals, however, there was bound to be a breaking point.

I agree. Jimmy Iovine was the perfect producer for Stevie. Too bad they had to get romantically involved and ruined such a great partnership. I also agree that Stevie has written some really great stuff post-Rumours, I happen to love the Phoenix Four as well as her newly written stuff on TISL-- "Fall From Grace" is just utter greatness. Another testament to Stevie's songwriting ability is that her demos, (before Lindsey gets his hands on them), are usually really good. Lindsey is definitely a wizard in the studio but Stevie's skeletal material is really good so he usually already has a good melody to work with. Lindsey being the anal retentive master of embellishments that he is, delivers the finished product but Stevie comes up with the lyrics and basic song structure. Sometimes I think Lindsey is given too much credit for Stevie's songwriting greatness, it's irritating.

[David]

Originally posted by trackaghost
A few people on the Rumours board were saying that they thought that Stevie hasn't written a decent song (bar Gyspy) since Bella Donna and any good tunes that she has released since then (ie Sorcerer, If You Ever Did Believe etc, etc) actually originated from the 1970s anyway. I think Stevie is still a really good songwriter who has always had this knack for wrapping her vocal style so intriguingly around her free-form lyrics. "Illume" is a new example of that art, & it's as pleasurable as her older material. I love her work on her "Street Angel" album because it seems blessedly devoid of that showoffy quality that marred some of her earlier solo albums. The "Street Angel" material just seems as if all pretense is dropped & she's there, older & more resigned to her advancing age (& all artists tackle that theme).

I'm also fed up with Lindsey getting all the credit for Stevie's best songs. I've heard the demo for Sara and that was genius before Lindsey put his magic touch on it. Her demo of "Sara"? The only demo of "Sara" I've ever heard is one where she's playing the piano -- possibly to a click track -- & singing. I wouldn't exactly call it a work of genius, but it certainly is heartfelt & breezily melodic. A lot of people keep calling the "cleaning lady" recording a demo, but it is not. It is Fleetwood Mac. Anyone can plainly hear Mick's brushes, John's bass, Stevie's tack piano & Lindsey's layers of acoustic guitar all over it -- a bunch of the same instrumental & vocal tracks, in fact, that were ultimately included on the album cut. It is "Sara" in the making at the Village Recorder, Studio D, & it's certainly a Buckingham production, for better or worse.

Bottom line: In my opinion, Stevie's still a really good songwriter. She's no Elvis Costello, but she never was -- then again, how many people are?

[David]

Originally posted by cliffdweller
I agree. Jimmy Iovine was the perfect producer for Stevie. But wasn't Jimmy really just a case of mostly invisible production? He filled the room with session players who had the savvy to blend smoothly with one another -- guys like Russ Kunkel, Bob Glaub, David Adelstein, Jeff Porcaro -- & basically just let them all record live. Jimmy's approach was far more translucent, you might say, in the studio with Stevie than Lindsey's opacity, which sometimes seemed self-conscious but which would frequently build magnificent castles of sound seemingly out of thin air, as one review put it. When it came to producing Stevie, Lindsey & Jimmy just had two entirely different approaches. I think Stevie benefited from both at various times: on some occasions she required a very invasive hand to generate musical ideas into a track, & at other times, you could just stand her in front of a mic, count in, & let her & the band take off.

[gldstwmn]

Originally posted by David
Bottom line: In my opinion, Stevie's still a really good songwriter. She's no Elvis Costello, but she never was -- then again, how many people are?

What I wouldn't give to hear Brilliant Mistake live sometime...sigh. On the other hand, Pump It up is no literary masterpiece.

[darklinensuit]

So many great songs have been released since Bella Donna, particularly the masterpiece that is TWH album.

- Jake

[DeeGeMe]

Originally posted by cliffdweller
Sometimes I think Lindsey is given too much credit for Stevie's songwriting greatness, it's irritating.

Amen, my friend! Having heard a lot of Stevie's raw demos, you get a real idea of how much Lindsey brought to the table, so to speak, and while I will not say that he hasn't added anything to her music, it's not like he's the end all and be all who made Stevie great either.

[blinker12]

Another thing to keep in mind re: Stevie's songwriting consistency:

In the 1970s, with Fleetwood Mac, she only released a few songs every couple of years. The quality was consistently VERY high because only her best songs made the albums.

In the 1980s, however, her output soared: She was releasing full solo albums every two years (or so), and also recording with the Mac. So of course her "batting average" went down a little.

That said, I think her songwriting DID go downhill in the late 80s/early 90s. That was largely because she didn't seem to trust herself anymore: she was relying on co-writers more than ever. Think about it: Hardly any of the songs on OSOTM, SA or BTM were solely written by Stevie. But ever since that talk with Tom Petty in 1995, when he told her he wouldn't help her write, she seems to have regained her confidence and is writing on her own again. And IMO, some of the stuff she's writing now ranks with her best (Thrown Down, TISL, SYW, Illume, Love Changes).

[face of glass]

Ok, I’ll bite. I’m one of those people who think that she has lost at least some of her songwriting skills. A lot of this is going to be just cut-and-paste of the rant I wrote on the Rumours board under the “Stevie on the Madonna/Britney MTV kiss” thread. I hope none of you will take this personally or anything. Remember, a person reacts with his/her emotional centers first and then afterwards tries to find a rational explanation to his/her actions. ;)

I’m speaking as a fan too, but also as a person who can not ignore what he hears.

What I was saying on the Rumours board is pretty much the following:

- I find Stevie’s demos of the ‘70s very moving and the same goes to the officially released versions of them. The only demos she did afterwards that I like are the more arranged ones.

- I think Stevie lost some of her songwriting inspiration after The Wild Heart. I love pretty much all of her work on that album and prior to that.

And then, the major point:

“What she writes these days and has written since the early ‘80s can be described as “the Nicksian drone”. And no, this doesn’t mean songs about men. That’s what her current demos sound like to me, unless they’re more arranged by other people. This means that she’s still milking those same old three chords to what it’s worth, just like she did during the ‘70s. However, this time there just isn’t that freshness anymore. If you write in a certain mode for a long time, you’re bound to run out of certain ideas, or at least your new efforts won’t be as memorable as the earlier ones. That’s what I think has happened to Stevie. Her way of writing hasn’t changed. She’s stated something like the following: all of her songs are extensions of previous ones and seem to capture only certain moods. I agree with that 100%.
So, why do I think that a lot of her songs on SYW are nearly as great as her best work? Simply because of Lindsey. If you look at what makes a song successful, it’s not the notes. The thing that matters the most is what chords are those notes against. Take something like the Beatles’ “Across The Universe”. The whole thing has a two or three note melody. If it didn’t have those rich chords and that tone colour backing it up, then no one would speak of it as a classic. Stevie writes usually with very basic chords. What a producer/arranger can do here is to make those chords richer. Lindsey’s the best for that job, but I do like the work that Jimmy Iovine, Rupert Hine and John Shanks did. They were trying to do the same thing that Lindsey did and while they didn’t succeed, they did come close, especially Iovine.”

- I do like a couple of her recent demos too. “Space Needle” and “Have No Heart”, but I believe those are arranged by other people.

- If someone was to officially release an album with Stevie’s demos on it with no additional production/arrangement work, I think it would flop. An interesting experiment it would be though. She needs help in many things that are purely musical or aural. I’m sure all of you can accept that.

“I wouldn’t put most of the credit on the producers’ shoulders either. I think fifty-fifty would be just right in this case. They can always hear in Stevie’s songs what someone untrained can not. A certain lyrical imagery can create a great arrangement in a producer’s head. I don’t think she’s untalented these days in songwriting, but I do think that certain people love those current demos because it’s Stevie singing them and she hasn’t changed her style.”

And then there’s another thing I’d like to add. I put Stevie myself in a special category called “the atmospheric artists”. Other artists in that category include Bob Dylan and Peter Hammill (if anyone cares). What I mean by this is that these artists write songs that have to be listened to as the writer performs them. It’s the whole package that counts, the overall arrangement, the chords of the song itself and the voice. Oh those voices. Some of the most magnificent in all music. However, take one of these elements away and a lot of the magic disappears. I’m not saying that the musical and lyrical values disappears though. I may think that Bob Dylan’s versions of his own songs are always the definitive ones (yes, even “All Along The Watchtower”), but I certainly can appreciate a good Dylan cover when I hear one. He transcends the borders of being “an atmospheric artist” and a lot of his songs (he has a noticeable amount of bad stuff too) can be taken at face value, without that voice and the performance. Peter Hammill will probably never transcend those borders, and I’m sure he doesn’t want to, because that would mean commercial success and a loss of his cult status.

So, Stevie is in between Dylan and Hammill. I think a lot of those ‘70s songs can be enjoyed at face value. There are plenty of covers of these. But when I go to Nicksfix and look at that list of cover songs, there’s pretty much none of her post-‘70s songs. That I think is the only objective meter of one’s songwriting skills. If other people are not interested in your work, then there’s something wrong.

And no, I’m not discussing her lyrics here, because I’m not much of a lyrics person myself. But I do think that she’s been consistent in that area. The ‘70s lyrics may move me more, but then there’s stuff like “Illume” which is pretty much the only song about 9-11 that I can honestly say has good lyrics. And what you can always rely upon is the voice. It’s never let me down, not even during RAL or TITN, which I think was the worst period for it. I’m not as hardcore as you people are (that’s not even possible in Finland, no one here listens to Stevie or the Rumours era Mac) but for me her recent writing just doesn’t cut it when you’re speaking of pure musical terms. For a lot of you it obviously works. But I do think that it’s mainly because she hasn’t changed her style, her voice is still there and so are those lyrics. She quite understandably refers to her current writing as poems. That’s what it is to me too, nothing much more.

I shall repeat myself once again and say that none of us can be truly objective in this matter. :)

[Johnny Stew]

This isn't directed at any one in particular, but I often wonder why so many people make so much out of the fact that many of Stevie's '80s and '90s songs were co-written.

Stevie is still the one writing the lyrics... it's just that someone else has written the music track.

No one makes a big deal of the fact that Richard Dashut co-wrote eight of the songs on Lindsey's 'Out Of The Cradle,' as well as "Book of Love, "Empire State," "Oh Diane," and "Family Man."

"I Want You," "What's The World Coming To," and "Come," were also co-written with other songwriters.

Several of Christine's songs over the years have been co-written as well... especially after she met Eddy Quintela.
And Lindsey and Christine are musicians.

Stevie's never claimed to be a musician, and has been very honest in regards to her relatively minor skills on the piano or the guitar.

I'm not trying to start a Stevie vs. ____ thing... I'm just wondering why it's a big deal that Stevie sometimes co-writes her material, and why that's often cited as a sign her talents had/have diminished, etc.

[Hippocampus]

Originally posted by Johnny Stew
Several of Christine's songs over the years have been co-written as well... especially after she met Eddy Quintela.



Actually, ALL of Christine's songs have been co-written since Mirage except for "Only Over You", "The Smile I Live For", "Everywhere" and "Behind The Mask". :)

[darklinensuit]

Refresh my memory, but didn't Mick use a co-writer for the hauntingly beautiful "These Strange Times"?:laugh:

- Jake

[dissention]

Originally posted by Hippocampus
Actually, ALL of Christine's songs have been co-written since Mirage except for..."Behind The Mask"

And that, IMO, is her best song :D BTM rocks!

[EveryHour]

Forgive me, but how can some of you even feel any emotion or get any pleasure from music when you analyze it to freakin' death?!:( I'm not trying to be rude, I just don't 'get it' at all.:shrug:

[EveryHour]

Originally posted by DeeGeMe
Amen, my friend! Having heard a lot of Stevie's raw demos, you get a real idea of how much Lindsey brought to the table, so to speak, and while I will not say that he hasn't added anything to her music, it's not like he's the end all and be all who made Stevie great either.

Very well put.

It all has to start with Stevie's incredible CONCEPTS before there can be anything to be built on!

[blinker12]

I'm just wondering why it's a big deal that Stevie sometimes co-writes her material, and why that's often cited as a sign her talents had/have diminished, etc.

Well, I think for me it just shows that she had lost some confidence in her ability to write songs on her own. In the 70s, she wrote all her songs by herself. As the 1980s wore on, she began to rely increasingly on outside collaborators _ as, probably not coincidentally, her substance abuse and psychological problems worsened.
She herself describes the talk with Tom Petty _ where he told her to write on her own _ as an epiphany. He saw it as a self-confidence issue: You don't need me or anyone else; just get out there and write your own songs again. And apparently, that resonated with her.

Also, I tend to prefer the songs Stevie writes by herself to the ones she co-writes. They seem more honest and closer to her heart _ and that translates into a more compelling performance, which I guess makes sense. Others may disagree _ actually, I'd be interested in hearing from someone who does _ but can a single one of her co-written songs compare to "Gypsy," "Sara" or "Silver Springs"?

I'm not saying that co-writing, in itself, is a bad thing. Just that in Stevie's case, I think she used it as a crutch when her own creative juices weren't flowing too freely.

[face of glass]

Originally posted by Johnny Stew
Stevie is still the one writing the lyrics... it's just that someone else has written the music track.

Yeah, and that's when everything's usually fine. When that voice sings those lyrics and everything is musically solid, then I'm pleased.

Originally posted by Johnny Stew

No one makes a big deal of the fact that Richard Dashut co-wrote eight of the songs on Lindsey's 'Out Of The Cradle,' as well as "Book of Love, "Empire State," "Oh Diane," and "Family Man."

"I Want You," "What's The World Coming To," and "Come," were also co-written with other songwriters.

That’s right. I haven’t seen a single article where even Lindsey himself would speak about Richard’s “significant input” into writing a particular song. It would be very strange to me if I was to find out that something so personal as “Street Of Dreams” has lyrical or even musical input from Mr. Dashut. Of course if it has, then I owe the man an apology.
Again, I can’t recall a single article where Lindsey would discuss his songwriting collaboration with Richard. This is why I tend to think that Richard really didn’t contribute anything to those songs that could be put down on paper as notes. I think he helped to shape the overall sound of the songs to such an extent that Lindsey decided to give him a writing credit along with a production credit. I’m sure LB felt Richard’s contributions were as significant as his own. But there’s no certainty about this. I hope that Richard’s Q&A in the upcoming future will answer some of these questions.

I’m not making fun of people because they resort to other people for inspiration. I’m sure you can see that from the “songwriting bible” I wrote yesterday. ;) Writing with other people has worked admirably well for each songwriter of the Rumours line-up. It can open you up to other areas and certain ideas you weren’t aware of. It can expand your knowledge a lot.

If there’s a particular song where I think a co-writer has definitely provided the main inspiration to, it’s “Come”. Neale Heywood came up with that great riff, the musical meat of the song. Lindsey shaped it into the monster (positive or negative, you decide) it turned out to be. Without Neale’s riff the song wouldn’t be as successful as it is.

Originally posted by EveryHour
Forgive me, but how can some of you even feel any emotion or get any pleasure from music when you analyze it to freakin' death?!:( I'm not trying to be rude, I just don't 'get it' at all.:shrug:

I’m sure you’re not trying to insult me or anything like that. I can separate the enjoyment of music from analysing it (hell, “Beautiful Child” and “Gypsy” always make me cry and “EFO” always makes me as excited as my cat when he gets his meal), and I do not usually analyse music when I’m listening to it (only when it’s something I’ve listened to A LOT). I do that afterwards, by comparing other people’s opinions on it to those that are my own. I do not feel the necessity to write the usual “I love this song, bye” or “I hate this song, goodbye” posts. I am here to share my thoughts with different people and I’m here to compare my opinions with theirs. If you don’t like this long-winded dross, you can always skip my posts when you see my screen name. Basically I think that no one here can reach objectivity on this subject, but you can always compare your thoughts with other people’s thoughts and use them to expand your knowledge. If you learn to know what someone else thinks and if you learn to understand why he/she thinks so, you can get closer to objectivity. And then you’ll get closer to heaven, believe you me. :)

Originally posted by EveryHour
It all has to start with Stevie's incredible CONCEPTS before there can be anything to be built on! [/B]

I agree. However, one shouldn’t forget that you may sometimes have to dismantle some of the foundations to get to the point where the song is more accessible for a casual listener. Ken Caillat speaks in his Q&A of Stevie’s original “Sara” demo, how it was 12 minutes long and had to be seriously cut down. A lot of his work (if not all) are accessible to you big fans, but I’m quite sure very little of the usual music listeners could appreciate those late period demos.
Originally posted by blinker12
Also, I tend to prefer the songs Stevie writes by herself to the ones she co-writes. They seem more honest and closer to her heart _ and that translates into a more compelling performance, which I guess makes sense. Others may disagree _ actually, I'd be interested in hearing from someone who does _ but can a single one of her co-written songs compare to "Gypsy," "Sara" or "Silver Springs"? [/B]

I agree. Whether someone feels it’s honest or not is irrelevant to me. It feels honest to me and that’s the only thing that matters in this world, damnit! ;) But what I basically tried to say was that her demos post-‘70s don’t do it to me. They are heartfelt, but they just feel like poems to me and that’s the biggest problem. I may rationalize a lot, but it all comes back to the “first, initial feeling”, which I pretty much said yesterday. That’s the only thing that matters. But I’m sure no Nickshead lost his/her will to sleep after reading this crazy rambling. ;)

[trackaghost]

In my opinion Stevie's music has not gone downhill at all.

After all this analysis, the one thing we have failed to mention is the song's worth is in what we as individuals take away from it, that's the beauty of art and music. Me personally, well I have consistently enjoyed and been moved by Stevie's work (although I agree her finest songs are generally the one's she has sole credit for). So I have never felt she has lost her "muse" or whatever you folks would like to call it.

Others will have a different take on it. Rock A Little, for example, is probably my least favourite of Stevie's solo albums, but my friend insists it's her best. Go figure! I also can't understand the hostility towards Street Angel although it's not her finest hour. It's all personal taste.

But I definitely think Lindsey gets too much credit. If the raw materials for him to work with weren't any good to begin with, it wouldn't matter how much care or attention or "magic" he worked into the song.

[David]

Originally posted by trackaghost
But I definitely think Lindsey gets too much credit. If the raw materials for him to work with weren't any good to begin with, it wouldn't matter how much care or attention or "magic" he worked into the song. I'd like to agree with this theoretically, but I can't. I think that you can take a dull song & build a very interesting track out of it: inventive, cerebral or emotional, intricately textured ear candy with the perfect vocal take on it. Think of "Trouble" or "Straight Back" or even "Brown Eyes." Conversely, you can take a great song & plaster the wrong arrangement & instrumentation all over it, like "Smile at You" on the new album, which winds up losing the qualities you originally responded to without gaining alternative qualities.

Form & content aren't always as insoluble as theorists tell us they are. You can separate the distinct appeal of the form of the song versus the way it has been conceptualized & built into a track.

[trackaghost]

I know what you are saying David, but, to use your example, not everyone prefers the old version of Smile At You. It's all a matter of personal response. We all take different things from music.

Listening to the demos of my favourite Stevie songs, in my own opinion many of them were great to begin with. And while I agree that you can ruin a good song with bad production, I personally think Lindsey had pretty good material to work on (as did Jimmy Iovine) with many of Stevie's songs. I'm just saying he doesn't deserve so much of the credit that people shower on him.

To use a crass saying (sorry) "you can't polish a turd!"
:D

[chiliD]

Originally posted by dissention
This sin't to say she hasn't put out some clunkers; she has and Not Make Believe can attest to that


One person's opinion. I hold the opposite one.

NMB is a "lost gem" (however, only in its final form on the ltd edition SYW) as far as I'm concerned.


I'm of the ilk that hold the opinion that Lindsey, Jimmy, & Heartbreaker Mike Campbell are the only folks to be able to take Stevie's "raw material" and mold into something listenable.

[chiliD]

Originally posted by face of glass
So, Stevie is in between Dylan and Hammill

DOROTHY HAMMILL?

[trackaghost]

Just to be controversial (hehe), it could be said that Lindsey's best music comes when he is working with Stevie...

Can we give Stevie some credit, please?

[face of glass]

Originally posted by trackaghost
After all this analysis, the one thing we have failed to mention is the song's worth is in what we as individuals take away from it, that's the beauty of art and music.

Oh, I’m well aware of that, but I thought the people contributing to this thread were aware of it anyway.

Me personally, well I have consistently enjoyed and been moved by Stevie's work (although I agree her finest songs are generally the one's she has sole credit for). So I have never felt she has lost her "muse" or whatever you folks would like to call it.

I understand that you are a big fan and you’re pleased with her current work just as much as with her “classic” one. However, what I was basically trying to say was that one should occasionally step outside “the fan zone” and look at the world like an observer. I presented things that I consider important, the fact that there are very little covers of Stevie’s post-‘70s work can’t be ignored. When I listen to her recent demos, I don’t just go “oh, that’s boring”. I also think if someone was to put out an album of this stuff, would it be successful? I think not. I do not know how large a hardcore fan base Stevie has in the United States, but I suppose it’s not any more than a couple dozen thousand people. These people would buy the demo album, but the other people, the hundreds of thousands that bought TISL, would not. There can be a big difference between what a casual listener wants and what an artist does. I don’t think Stevie herself understands what the public wants, so she wisely gives her work to a producer.

But I definitely think Lindsey gets too much credit. If the raw materials for him to work with weren't any good to begin with, it wouldn't matter how much care or attention or "magic" he worked into the song.

I’m not going to dispute this. I said earlier that I would give fifty percent of the credit to Lindsey and fifty percent to Stevie (sorry Mick and John, but this is about songwriting). I certainly don’t believe that these songs with their fancy arrangements would sound as good if it was not Stevie singing them. If it wasn’t Stevie singing them, I’m sure Lindsey couldn’t come up with as majestic an arrangement. If it wasn’t for those lyrics, Lindsey wouldn’t add certain things he does. He’s known this woman for a long time and definitely knows what he can do with her songs. And again, Stevie seems to go into certain areas vocally only when she’s singing on a song that Lindsey has arranged. They both need each other in this respect, and the rest can be discussed on the Buckinghamnicks.net message board. ;)

Originally posted by David
Form & content aren't always as insoluble as theorists tell us they are. You can separate the distinct appeal of the form of the song versus the way it has been conceptualized & built into a track.

Right you are. However, with Stevie’s recent work I rarely can do that. It could and still can be done with her ‘70s songs but when you take the lyrics and vocals out of a recent Nicks demo, what do we have? A very generic (thanks Lindsey) set of chords that anyone with a little musical training could come up with. However, I may be wrong since this is all just my impression. I have a little suggestion here for any Nicksfan who has the time and the musical skill. Take a recent Stevie demo, replace its lyrics with your own and sing it with your own voice and accompany yourself with her chords. Then we’ll see what attraction it’ll have. ;)

Originally posted by chiliD
NMB is a "lost gem" (however, only in its final form on the ltd edition SYW) as far as I'm concerned.

In complete agreement. That’s what the polar bears ought to be singing around here.

I'm of the ilk that hold the opinion that Lindsey, Jimmy, & Heartbreaker Mike Campbell are the only folks to be able to take Stevie's "raw material" and mold into something listenable.

As am I, as if the readers don’t already know that. I’d just like the people here to look at those last two words in that post ChiliD wrote. “Something listenable”. I personally value an artist who can make his/her work accessible to the general public without being overtly tasteless or resorting to cheap tricks. You can write all the deep artistic stuff you want and you can be as experimental as you like but you certainly won’t be recognized by the public. The thing is, you have to find the golden middle. The Beatles did that for instance. They will be remembered when rock’n’roll is long gone. I’m not saying that the only music that has value is the one that has commercial success (heaven forbid), but rather that those who can combine the experimental and the tradition are the ones most likely to have success. Ok, it didn’t happen to Lindsey with Out Of The Cradle but there’s another reason to that and it will be brought up one day in his forum. But I don’t think Stevie on her own has achieved that kind of combination for a long time. Ask yourself, if she was to start all over again today with nothing but her current demos, would there be any success? Would these songs be classics for all the world to hear?

DOROTHY HAMMILL?

Sorry, I don’t skate. But I thought a veteran like yourself would have heard at least Van Der Graaf Generator.

Originally posted by trackaghost
Just to be controversial (hehe), it could be said that Lindsey's best music comes when he is working with Stevie...

Sure, why not. ;) But I think all of his songs with Stevie’s harmony vocals on them would have worked quite well without her contributions. “Miranda” and “Say Goodbye” didn’t really need Stevie’s vocals. I do agree with you in a way though. Those Buckingham Nicks harmonies from the ‘70s are terrific and they still can bring a chill up one’s spine. Especially on “Everybody Finds Out”.

Can we give Stevie some credit, please?

I haven’t ever said in this thread that she doesn’t deserve some. If fifty percent for Stevie and fifty percent for Lindsey won’t satisfy you, then how about 50,000000000000001 % for Stevie and 49,999999999999999 % for Lindsey? ;)

[cliffdweller]

Originally posted by darklinensuit
So many great songs have been released since Bella Donna, particularly the masterpiece that is TWH album.

- Jake

Bump. That album is a masterpiece.

[SmthngOfADreamr]

Originally posted by trackaghost

Can we give Stevie some credit, please?

Apparently not on this message board! That's not how it seems to work around here. :laugh: :rolleyes:

I don't think that Stevie's songwriting has gone downhill. Once she got herself off the drugs and back on track, it seems to me as if it's only gotten better.

There will never be another Dreams or Rhiannon. That's just the way it is. I personally am not looking for the same old thing anyway.

And Lindsey does deserve some credit, but not ALL the credit. For me, they're at their best when they are together. Besides, if Stevie is such a bad songwriter, then why would Lindsey say that he would love for the two of them to collaborate in the future???

[wondergirl9847]

Her songwriting has NOT gone downhill...it's changed and it's different than before, but hey, guess what....people change. They get older and experience different things. Lindsey's songwriting has changed too because of his marriage and kids.

I don't like ALL of her demos (some are excrutiating...in terms of repetitiveness and monotony mostly), but some are phenominal and it's painful that certain songs were released (Rock a Little? Ugh) while others are still in "the vault". (Space Needle) :( Then again, some people hate SN and love RAL...so, it all comes down to...what's that word I like to use alot..oh yeah, opinion.

I think Lindsey gets plenty of credit for shaping her songs, he just doesn't get his due on like...Rolling Stone lists or in general. :distress:

[Hippocampus]

Originally posted by face of glass
I understand that you are a big fan and you’re pleased with her current work just as much as with her “classic” one. However, what I was basically trying to say was that one should occasionally step outside “the fan zone” and look at the world like an observer. I presented things that I consider important, the fact that there are very little covers of Stevie’s post-‘70s work can’t be ignored.


I just don't get the logic on this one. I could understand your point if say Lindsey's or Christine's post-70's songs did get covered by other artists, unlike Stevie's... Fact is they're not, far from it and that's stating the obvious. Are their songwriting abilities burning out too ? No it's more an indication that Fleetwood Mac and its members have slipped into relative obscurity than anything else.

As for the listenable part, Trouble In Shangri-La was released to raving reviews and didn't have any production work done by Lindsey or Iovine. My favorite song on the album (Bombay Sapphires) was produced by none other than Stevie herself... I do give the woman some credit for the sound she wants on the finished tracks. She did after all pull the plug on Dallas Austin's production because it didn't fit her style and had several other tracks redone. And let's not get started on Street Angel :)

I know this probably all boils down to opinions and preferences but to me, she certainly doesn't need anyone specific to make her songs work. A good producer yes but who doesn't need one ?

[seteca]

I think her songs on SYW are her best since the Tusk album, so, no I definitely don't think her songwriting has gone downhill.

:wavey: :wavey: :wavey:

[EveryHour]

Originally posted by wondergirl9847
Her songwriting has NOT gone downhill...it's changed and it's different than before, but hey, guess what....people change. They get older and experience different things. Lindsey's songwriting has changed too because of his marriage and kids.

I think Lindsey gets plenty of credit for shaping her songs, he just doesn't get his due on like...Rolling Stone lists or in general. :distress:

(a) Thank you! That's what can be strange about attitudes toward famous people and/or people who you feel help shaped parts of your life....you don't want them to change. But at 24, I am certainly not the same person I was at 15, nor are any of the "original" fans who are 50-something now the same person they were in 1977. Stevie is not immune to this natural sway of life, so I agree that her writing may in some ways be different but it is certainly not WORSE! If she had never changed, then people would be harping on that anyway! No one likes when they see an artist who has been around for 30 years just trying to be a pale imitation of what they once were. She just has different things to say now, but her essence has always been there.

(b)SO TRUE!























people would be harping on her for that anyway!

[face of glass]

Originally posted by SmthngOfADreamr
Besides, if Stevie is such a bad songwriter, then why would Lindsey say that he would love for the two of them to collaborate in the future???

I was not saying she’s ever been a bad songwriter. I was just explaining why I don’t like her recent demos and also tried to come up with some pseudo-objective statements to back up my feelings on her latest works.

Originally posted by wondergirl9847
Her songwriting has NOT gone downhill...it's changed and it's different than before, but hey, guess what....people change. They get older and experience different things. Lindsey's songwriting has changed too because of his marriage and kids.

That’s what a few people have been saying here. That she’s changed, she’s matured and so has her writing. I don’t agree with that myself, simply because it feels to me that it’s still the same Nicksian drone. Lindsey’s growing up in his songwriting is far more obvious to me than Stevie’s. But then it’s the different things that we find from music. Maybe her lyric writing has changed somewhat, but the chords she uses are still the same they’ve always been. She could have expanded her palette by getting some musical training in the early ‘80s, but obviously she thought focusing on her image was more interesting in the end. I’m not going to lambaste her because of that though. Stevie is more than her songs anyway; that image was unique in the American culture of the time and it was a large part of her impact on people.
The thing is, I will never have Stevie as my very favourite songwriter (I don’t even have any) or anything like that. Much of her music moves me a lot, but it only functions in certain emotional centres for me. She makes me cry in a way Lindsey and Chris haven’t. She can rock when she wants to and she damn well means a lyric when she’s singing it. But her palette is very small in the end when compared to Lindsey. Our man expanded his writing style a lot. He has a lot of catchy songs such as “Second Hand News” or a lot of the songs on Tusk. He has a dark edge to his music too, something like “Street Of Dreams” or “Murrow” comes into mind immediately. He can be serious when he wants to. And then he can just do something that’s just a giddy piece of fun like “Family Man” or “Johnny Stew”. He is a more diverse writer to me than Stevie is and because I love diverse artists, I prefer Lindsey, even though he can’t do what Stevie can.

This leads me to another thing, something that occasionally tends to get mentioned on these boards. People seem to assume in a lot of places that deep, serious music equals substantial music. I basically think this is a false assumption. It’s so easy to say that something like “When I See You Again” is substantial and “Family Man” is not. This is all in your minds people and there is no objectivity in a matter like this. When a Tango In The Night discussion comes up on these boards, some people say that Stevie’s songs add a substantial quality to the album. I claim that “Family Man” is just as substantial as anything Stevie has ever written, even though it certainly isn’t even close to Lindsey’s or Stevie’s best. Why should people think that something sad, or something with serious lyrics is substantial? Why do people assume these feelings are deep? Why do they use the word “substantial” with objectivity, when it completely depends upon the person what he/she thinks is substantial? A wise man once said something like: a good laugh is as precious to me as a shed tear and a good “goof-off” is as worthy as a terrific cathartic state. I couldn’t agree more. Laughing can be as deep as crying.

And now, back to the original topic. I guess you can now see why I think Stevie’s songwriting is in decline in a musical sense. I feel that it’s always the same serious, deep mood and that’s that. I can never feel an ounce of humour in her songs and I definitely can not see her singing something just for the fun of it. If she had been diversifying her style recently, I would appreciate her writing more. But to me it just feels that it hasn’t happened. I do not want Stevie to do the same thing, I want her to change. It just seems she won’t be able to, and a part of that is because of her musical limitations. I’m sure she just wants to record something funny, a piece of nonsense or whatever. However, she’s been in the same mode for so long that she doesn’t know how to do it. I love it when she gets bouncy, for instance, like on “Jimmy Come On Back” or the title track of Say You Will (surprise, surprise, not a lot of hardcores seem to like these). But even this seems like it’s because of her producers. A lot of you fans however feel, that she’s not doing the same thing, that the lyrics are different and the vocal melody might differ, but for me this thing just isn’t as simple as that. I can’t feel any changes.

I think Lindsey gets plenty of credit for shaping her songs, he just doesn't get his due on like...Rolling Stone lists or in general.

On this board he pretty much gets his due, maybe even too much as some people like to speculate. But I believe there are still fans who think that it’s Stevie who does all the music and all that music just comes through her, even on stage. This tends to happen to bands with a very charismatic frontman/woman. Genesis suffered from this after Peter Gabriel had left, so did the Doors when they had Jim Morrison. I believe the amount of people who think “it’s all Stevie’s doing” is diminishing all the time, but there are still some left. Not here maybe, but elsewhere.

Originally posted by Hippocampus
I just don't get the logic on this one. I could understand your point if say Lindsey's or Christine's post-70's songs did get covered by other artists, unlike Stevie's... Fact is they're not, far from it and that's stating the obvious.

I wasn’t comparing her “cover popularity” to Lindsey’s or Chris’. Chris may have had the most hits, but she definitely didn’t have an overwhelming charisma like Stevie does. Lindsey’s post-Rumours work has pretty much all been underrated in my opinion. I was comparing Stevie to Bob Dylan. Now you may say that Dylan’s been in the business longer and is therefore more popular. However, I don’t think any single Dylan album has sold as much as “Bella Donna” has. Stevie was “the face of the day” one time, yet her success lessened because she couldn’t keep certain songwriting standards up.
If Stevie’s classic period is usually considered the ‘70s, then for Bob Dylan it’s 1962-1970, at the end of which the release of Selfportrait had a lot of his fans running away from him) and 1974-1976, when he released the acclaimed albums Planet Waves, Blood On The Tracks and Desire. 1977- now is usually seen as a regressive period. I went to the All-Music Guide to see who has covered his post-1976 songs. I’m not including unknown artists into this list. This is what came up:

“Gotta Serve Somebody”:
Booker T. & the MG’s
David Allan Coe
Natalie Cole
Devo

“Every Grain Of Sand”:
Emmylou Harris

“Death Is Not The End”:
Nick Cave
The Waterboys

“Man In The Long Black Coat”:
Emerson, Lake & Palmer

“Dignity”:
Joe Cocker
Robyn Hitchcock

“To Make You Feel My Love”:
Billy Joel

“Mississippi”:
Sheryl Crow

I’m sure I could find a lot more if I had the time. And believe me, these are all recognized artists, just look at how many times their pages at AMG have been visited.

Are their songwriting abilities burning out too ? No it's more an indication that Fleetwood Mac and its members have slipped into relative obscurity than anything else.

I agree with this. Though I believe that Stevie wouldn’t have slipped into relative obscurity had she diversified her craft.

As for the listenable part, Trouble In Shangri-La was released to raving reviews and didn't have any production work done by Lindsey or Iovine. My favorite song on the album (Bombay Sapphires) was produced by none other than Stevie herself... I do give the woman some credit for the sound she wants on the finished tracks.

Well, I guess this comment was written because of a gaffe I made. I said earlier that I also respect Rupert Hine’s and John Shanks’ work, but then I later answered to ChiliD in a way that made it seem I only cared for Buckingham or Iovine/Campbell production. My mistake, sorry.
I do agree that Stevie deserves credit on pulling the plug on her album. She’s worked with guys who have done miracles with her demos so I’m sure she pretty much knows by now how she wants her music to sound. The question is though, could she have come up with those arrangements herself?

I know this probably all boils down to opinions and preferences but to me, she certainly doesn't need anyone specific to make her songs work. A good producer yes but who doesn't need one ?

And I’m glad she understands she needs one. God knows what would happen if she just wanted to release a demo album.

Originally posted by EveryHour
Thank you! That's what can be strange about attitudes toward famous people and/or people who you feel help shaped parts of your life....you don't want them to change.

The thing is, I want her to change yet I feel she hasn’t. Or at least her music hasn’t. That’s the biggest problem.

We can go on about this for a long time I suppose. You all have raised some good points and I do realize I’m just speaking about my feelings in the end. That’s what we’re all doing here. We feel something very strongly and then start bringing out some rational points that only support what we feel. We hesitate bringing out points that might be contradictory to our feelings. Who knows, maybe there’s someone here who even wants the opponent to crack and confess that he/she is wrong. That’s not what I want and I’d like to think I haven’t tried doing it.
I wouldn’t write this much about one issue if it wasn’t Stevie we’re talking about. I LOVE a lot of this woman’s work and when I start to feel that something is missing, that the freshness is gone, then I start feeling bad. Stevie has given so much for all of us throughout the years that criticizing her might seem harsh. I don’t however, see any problems with enjoying the work I love just as much as I’ve enjoyed it before, even though I’ve written all this stuff. But I guess I better tone down at last. :)

[chiliD]

Originally posted by face of glass
Sorry, I don’t skate. But I thought a veteran like yourself would have heard at least Van Der Graaf Generator.


I was joking...of course I know of Van Der Graaf Generator.

[face of glass]

Originally posted by chiliD
I was joking...of course I know of Van Der Graaf Generator.

I thought so. I wonder if our lady could do some skating ballet. :)

[trackaghost]

Originally posted by face of glass


I do agree that Stevie deserves credit on pulling the plug on her album. She’s worked with guys who have done miracles with her demos so I’m sure she pretty much knows by now how she wants her music to sound. The question is though, could she have come up with those arrangements herself?


I am assuming that no one here has worked with Stevie (lucky you if you have) but how do you know Stevie hasn't come up with some of these arrangements herself? We can judge a little by the demos but ultimately we don't know how much she works out and contributes. Plus I believe Stevie is strong willed enough to know what she does and does not like! I know she goes away and leaves Lindsey to it some times (last time it was due to tour commitments) but if Lindsey came up with something he thought was incredible and Stevie didn't want to do it that way, I'm certain she wouldn't go along with it.

I guess I just get annoyed at people knocking Stevie's ability as a songwriter, when clearly she is very talented regardless of the amount of help she gets. She's not exactly some pop puppet is she? Please let's give her, her due!

I also feel uncomfortable with all this, because it seems like a symptom of the general reluctance of people to give women in the music industry credit for their own work. I've seen it with so many of my favourite artists. Female singer/songwriters and musicians always get overlooked as credible artists. :distress: It's a shame because I do think Stevie and others like her, have fought hard to be thought of as serious songwriters.

I also think even the best artists need a good producer. Sometimes that producer happens to be themselves, sometimes it does not. Personally, as much as I love Lindsey - diverse as he is - I don't think he has come up with anything by himself to match Stevie at her best (and admittedly some of this is produced by him). This is all opinion of course!!! I know some will disagree but Stevie's larger fan base show she has broader appeal at the very least.

Before you call me a populist or whatever, I'd also like to say my favourite albums include Slint's Spiderland and Jeff Buckley's Grace - not particularly big sellers - so I don't just like stuff that is commercial. I also tend to listen to music because it moves me, rather than the technical ability involved. That's why I always considered Neil Young a better guitarist than say, Joe Satriani or Steve Vai. Stevie may never be experimental but as long as her music has soul, then I don't care.

One last thing, I think a lot of Stevie's records are fun! It doesn't have to be a comedy record or making a joke to be fun.

:)

[Johnny Stew]

Originally posted by face of glass
That’s what a few people have been saying here. That she’s changed, she’s matured and so has her writing. I don’t agree with that myself, simply because it feels to me that it’s still the same Nicksian drone. Lindsey’s growing up in his songwriting is far more obvious to me than Stevie’s. But then it’s the different things that we find from music. Maybe her lyric writing has changed somewhat, but the chords she uses are still the same they’ve always been. She could have expanded her palette by getting some musical training in the early ‘80s, but obviously she thought focusing on her image was more interesting in the end.I, for one, have always been VERY glad that Stevie never took music lessons. One of the coolest things about her is that she writes straight from her heart & psyche... it's not filtered thru any kind of rigid musical "rules."
Even Lindsey has said that he envies that ability.

I don't think she intentionally focused on her image, at the sake of her songwriting... I think it's just that she was/is very aware of what makes her songwriting unique, and she didn't want to tamper with that.

In regards to Stevie's "growth" vs. Lindsey's... and certainly you're entitled to your opinion... but Stevie's always been considered more of a lyricist, not a musician in the way Lindsey and Christine are.
She has rudimentary skills on the piano and guitar... just enough to get by... but that's all. And she's never claimed otherwise.

And while Lindsey's lyrics have definitely improved, I have to say that I don't really hear any major progression in the way he writes music. Several songs on 'Say You Will' are written in the same vein musically as several songs he's recorded in the past.
And many of the production techniques he's still using (left/right channel panning, V.S.O. altered voices and sounds, etc.), are the same techniques he's been using for decades.

I'm not knocking Lindsey at all... as I've stated before, I'm a huge L.B. fan, and I love what he does.
But beyond the lyrical advances, I don't see a huge progession in his music.
He and Stevie have both matured and have grown in their writing, but neither is necessarily light-years away from what they were doing in 1973.

The thing is, I will never have Stevie as my very favourite songwriter (I don’t even have any) or anything like that. Much of her music moves me a lot, but it only functions in certain emotional centres for me. She makes me cry in a way Lindsey and Chris haven’t. She can rock when she wants to and she damn well means a lyric when she’s singing it. But her palette is very small in the end when compared to Lindsey. Our man expanded his writing style a lot.
He is a more diverse writer to me than Stevie is and because I love diverse artists, I prefer Lindsey, even though he can’t do what Stevie can.I understand what you're saying, but I also see diversity in Stevie's writing (though in perhaps more subtle ways).
I just tend to think the fact that years (and sometimes decades) go by in between Lindsey's releases, makes for a more marked contrast between the sound of his material.
There's a pretty massive leap between 'Go Insane' and 'Out Of The Cradle'... but there's also nine years separating the two.

This leads me to another thing, something that occasionally tends to get mentioned on these boards. People seem to assume in a lot of places that deep, serious music equals substantial music. I basically think this is a false assumption. It’s so easy to say that something like “When I See You Again” is substantial and “Family Man” is not. This is all in your minds people and there is no objectivity in a matter like this. When a Tango In The Night discussion comes up on these boards, some people say that Stevie’s songs add a substantial quality to the album. I claim that “Family Man” is just as substantial as anything Stevie has ever written, even though it certainly isn’t even close to Lindsey’s or Stevie’s best. Why should people think that something sad, or something with serious lyrics is substantial? Why do people assume these feelings are deep? Why do they use the word “substantial” with objectivity, when it completely depends upon the person what he/she thinks is substantial? A wise man once said something like: a good laugh is as precious to me as a shed tear and a good “goof-off” is as worthy as a terrific cathartic state. I couldn’t agree more. Laughing can be as deep as crying.You make a very good point... though I'm not convinced that Lindsey meant "Family Man" (for example), as comic relief. ;)

Lindsey himself has often said that most of his songs are almost completely finished, before he writes the lyrics. Or he works with only the tiniest of lyrical fragments.
This is his strong-suit, and no one questions it... but as a listener, I tend to react more to the lyrics (which, for me, are the meat & potatoes of a song), than I do to the music (the gravy).

Other listeners are the opposite way, and that's another great thing about this band... there really is something for pretty much everyone.

There is something of great value in the writing of each of the three 'Rumours'-era songwriters, but I'll always be more drawn to Stevie's work, because it reaches me in bigger way.

I hope she continues to grow and mature, but I don't see a necessity to change dramatically, when what she's doing already appeals (and speaks to) so many people.

[chiliD]

Originally posted by Johnny Stew
There's a pretty massive leap between 'Go Insane' and 'Out Of The Cradle'... but there's also nine years separating the two.


Hmmmmm...interesting. I hear more of a leap from Law & Order to Mirage to Go Insane than I do from Go Insane onward; and actually Say You Will (or Gift Of Screws) is more of a step BACKWARDS to Tusk yet keeping SOME essences of Out Of The Cradle

[face of glass]

Originally posted by trackaghost
I am assuming that no one here has worked with Stevie (lucky you if you have) but how do you know Stevie hasn't come up with some of these arrangements herself? We can judge a little by the demos but ultimately we don't know how much she works out and contributes. Plus I believe Stevie is strong willed enough to know what she does and does not like!

Well, I admit I went too far there. I can’t know for sure what she comes up with. I do believe myself that if there was an idea she’d like to add to a particular song, she’d already include it in the demo. But of course, some things get developed in the studio with the musicians. I’m not sure how Stevie would communicate with the musicians though. I think she wouldn’t be able to suggest a certain part to them. However I’m sure she knows what she wants from her music and can say whether she likes what she hears or not. I am giving her credit on this matter too.

I know she goes away and leaves Lindsey to it some times (last time it was due to tour commitments) but if Lindsey came up with something he thought was incredible and Stevie didn't want to do it that way, I'm certain she wouldn't go along with it.

In agreement. I don’t think he has full control on her songs. Which means that Stevie must have approved of the new version of “Smile At You” too. Some people may not like the new version, but they shouldn’t pour all the blame on Lindsey’s neck.

I guess I just get annoyed at people knocking Stevie's ability as a songwriter, when clearly she is very talented regardless of the amount of help she gets. She's not exactly some pop puppet is she? Please let's give her, her due!

She still has talent, I’m sure of that. I still think her latest work is unmemorable to me on its own, but it’s still just an opinion. I believe though, that the great songwriters usually have at least a grasp of what a song is going to be. A lot of these songs can sound good in their demo forms too (look at Bob Dylan’s demos on The Bootleg Series 1-3, or the Lennon demos on the Lennon Anthology, or the Beatles’ Anthologies). Stevie’s latest demos don’t, and that’s because I believe she doesn’t have an understanding of what a song of hers is going to be. I believe you could make a great singer-songwriter album of her ‘70s demos with the barest of arrangements, but I just believe you can’t do that with her recent offerings. But this is another time I’ve disguised the same argument, so I’ll leave it at that. We just won’t reach consensus on this. ;)

I also feel uncomfortable with all this, because it seems like a symptom of the general reluctance of people to give women in the music industry credit for their own work. I've seen it with so many of my favourite artists. Female singer/songwriters and musicians always get overlooked as credible artists.

I don’t overlook them, or at least I like to think so myself. I have a significant amount of albums by Joni Mitchell, Carole King, Patti Smith, Rickie Lee Jones, Kate Bush, Bjork (if you can’t handle umlauts), etc. I enjoy them just as much as the cream of the male artists. Female artists have been seriously underrepresented in rock’n’roll and that’s simply because of some preconceived notions that have existed for far too long. I’d like to state though, that there’s one thing that Stevie and these women have incommon. I believe those six women mentioned above are all in control of their work, know what they want to sound like and do a lot of the arrangement work themselves. Stevie doesn’t do all of that and I’m sure she wouldn’t know how. She’s not really that responsible of how something by her is arranged. She just approves the results or not. Which is important in itself, but then again I can’t call her “the queen of rock” because of that. She isn’t as independent in musical decisions as those seven women mentioned above, and that’s why I’m contributing to this thread.

I also think even the best artists need a good producer. Sometimes that producer happens to be themselves, sometimes it does not. Personally, as much as I love Lindsey - diverse as he is - I don't think he has come up with anything by himself to match Stevie at her best (and admittedly some of this is produced by him). This is all opinion of course!!! I know some will disagree but Stevie's larger fan base show she has broader appeal at the very least.

Stevie definitely needs a producer. However, a great song can sound great if you perform it with just a lute or something like that. Stevie’s recent demos don’t have that quality for me, unfortunate as it is.
And I wrote earlier that Stevie and Lindsey are very different writers who hit different emotional centres in me and that’s why I can’t really choose between either of them, even though I prefer Lindsey in the end, just because of his consistency.
Yes, Stevie has broader appeal. A part of this is due to her image, a part of this due to her records. Ken Caillat had a theory on this too, something like: Stevie’s comfortable with people and it comes through her music, Lindsey’s not and it comes through his music. I disagree with this myself, simply because I can’t really find such “comfortable” qualities in Stevie’s writing. I’m sure a lot of her work comes off to a casual listener as inaccessible and incomprehensible at first. However, Stevie’s producers change all that. That’s the biggest problem for me, because for all their good qualities, albums like TOSOTM and TISL sound utterly mainstream. They can be used as background music, they won’t really challenge you with anything musically shocking and they certainly won’t have you spilling coffee on your table or anything like that (ok, “Fall From Grace” maybe but that’s that). Lindsey’s solo work is more challenging, maybe not as accessible but possibly even more rewarding than this segment of Stevie’s solo work in the end. I honour the artist who experiments and tries new things with the traditional more than the one who’s willing to attach to the mainstream. Lindsey might never have Stevie’s appeal, but I have more respect for him because he’s done what his artistic impulses tell him, not trying to bow to the mainstream too much. I do believe there are things Stevie herself regrets having sung.

Before you call me a populist or whatever, I'd also like to say my favourite albums include Slint's Spiderland and Jeff Buckley's Grace - not particularly big sellers - so I don't just like stuff that is commercial. I also tend to listen to music because it moves me, rather than the technical ability involved. That's why I always considered Neil Young a better guitarist than say, Joe Satriani or Steve Vai. Stevie may never be experimental but as long as her music has soul, then I don't care.

I wasn’t going to call you a populist anyway. I love both Grace (which obviously has sold a lot more after Jeff’s death than it did before it) and Spiderland, but I do have appreciation for commercial music done with taste too, not just Fleetwood Mac but Abba, the Beach Boys, the friggin’ Beatles, a lot of Burt Bacharach’s ‘60s productions etc. And if the music moves me, it doesn’t matter what it is or who’s made it or what style is it in and so forth. A good one chord punk song can do a lot more to me than a bad 20-minute progressive rock suite with several changes of tempo and tonalities. I consider Neil Young above those guitar technicians too. Spiderland is a good example here. I don’t think the boys of Slint had any impressive playing talent. What matters is how they arranged the album, with those quiet whispers alternating with the loud passages brilliantly. The only song there that I would consider memorable in a different arrangement is “Washer”. The rest pretty much depends upon the way it’s been arranged and carefully pre-planned (it’s math-rock, isn’t it?).
I don’t care if Stevie never gets experimental like Lindsey does. The soul is still there, but she hasn’t found any new ways of expressing it. Which is why I prefer to listen to these songs in their final guises.

One last thing, I think a lot of Stevie's records are fun! It doesn't have to be a comedy record or making a joke to be fun.

Well, Lindsey hasn’t really made musical jokes that way. A playful atmosphere can be enough. Or something that shows the artist isn’t really taking things all too seriously. I just can’t find that in Stevie’s music.

Originally posted by Johnny Stew
I, for one, have always been VERY glad that Stevie never took music lessons. One of the coolest things about her is that she writes straight from her heart & psyche... it's not filtered thru any kind of rigid musical "rules."
Even Lindsey has said that he envies that ability.

I understand that. And I’ve never, ever felt that I should question her honesty in writing. It’s always very apparent to me. However, if I again had to compare her to those six women I listed above, then I certainly wouldn’t see what makes Stevie more honest and open in her writing than them. If someone starts telling me that Joni Mitchell’s guitar playing talent and singing technique both prevent her from exposing her psyche, then I would call that person seriously biased. In fact, you could also turn this completely around. What if she actually wanted to do something different for a change, what if her heart and psyche told her to do that? She wouldn’t be able to do it, because she has limited musical skills. The rigid musical rules she has, the small bunch of chords, the web that is her own, wouldn’t allow her to do it. I can understand Lindsey envying that ability though. It’s something he doesn’t have himself, so I guess it’s natural for him to want it. ;)
By music lessons I didn’t mean strict theory or anything like that. You can expand your writing skills in other ways too.

I don't think she intentionally focused on her image, at the sake of her songwriting... I think it's just that she was/is very aware of what makes her songwriting unique, and she didn't want to tamper with that.

I get that too. However, by doing this she seriously limited her audience to a certain point, I believe.

In regards to Stevie's "growth" vs. Lindsey's... and certainly you're entitled to your opinion... but Stevie's always been considered more of a lyricist, not a musician in the way Lindsey and Christine are.
She has rudimentary skills on the piano and guitar... just enough to get by... but that's all. And she's never claimed otherwise.

I agree with the latter point. However, if she’s always been thought to be focusing on the lyrical side of things, and if her skills haven’t worsened in songwriting, then how come her post-‘70s material hasn’t been good enough for other performers? Why do they think “Landslide” is better than “When I See You Again”?

And while Lindsey's lyrics have definitely improved, I have to say that I don't really hear any major progression in the way he writes music. Several songs on 'Say You Will' are written in the same vein musically as several songs he's recorded in the past.
And many of the production techniques he's still using (left/right channel panning, V.S.O. altered voices and sounds, etc.), are the same techniques he's been using for decades.

Well, okay. You caught me there. I did confuse maturing in lyrics and changing in songwriting up. I could argue that there is some musical growth too. It wasn’t for nothing that Lee Hirschberg said of “Soul Drifter”; “Oh, a real song!” (thanks to Madnessfades.net for this one). I can’t recall anything like “Red Rover” in the history of pop music. But you could claim that those are just exceptions and maybe that’s just what they are. ;) He hasn’t really been adding that many things into his style since Tusk.
What I should have said: Lindsey has always, from the start, appeared as the most diverse writer of the Rumours line-up. Lindsey has an approach similar to the Beatles; a record should contain diverse moods and surprises. He can be angry, he can be depressed and sad, he can be in a completely joyous mood, he can make a good musical joke and he can sometimes just spook you out. When he puts all this on a single album, like on Say You Will, then my respect for him just increases. He uses similar ideas but often in different contexts so that they appear with a new feel on them. That’s my opinion and I’m sticking with it. :)

I understand what you're saying, but I also see diversity in Stevie's writing (though in perhaps more subtle ways).

I know a fan can often hear different things in every different piece an artist writes. That’s why they are fans, they have been listening to this stuff a lot and are very comfortable with it. However, the thing is that this is pop music. If you have to listen to a piece several times to hear the differences between it and another piece, then I think it’s not worth the trouble. Anything in this world, anything, even someone farting into a microphone, can start to sound good if the listener is prepared and it is listened to enough. Which can mean a hundred million times all the same. However, you shouldn’t really have to struggle to hear the differences, this is pop music after all. If you have to, then you’ll become a fan. And then you’ll become biased and start to think that a song that a casual listener thinks sound like another song has subtle differences to that other song. This is just my point of view though.

There's a pretty massive leap between 'Go Insane' and 'Out Of The Cradle'... but there's also nine years separating the two.

It’s not that massive in my opinion, if you take into account that his Tango In The Night songs are there to form a bridge. And even if they weren’t, the rhythm machine-like beats still appear on Out Of The Cradle. Plus, “Loving Cup” seems to rekindle his love with picking.

You make a very good point... though I'm not convinced that Lindsey meant "Family Man" (for example), as comic relief. ;)

Well I’m also quite sure that he didn’t intend it to be a deep soul searching piece of the utmost seriousness. Though I’m quite sure there are people who think it was intended as such. ;)

but as a listener, I tend to react more to the lyrics (which, for me, are the meat & potatoes of a song), than I do to the music (the gravy).

Which is all just fine. I don’t listen to music because of the lyrics mainly and that’s simply because I think no rock’n’roll artist can even get close to the greatest works in literature. But that’s just my opinion.

Other listeners are the opposite way, and that's another great thing about this band... there really is something for pretty much everyone.

I agree. The diversity of the Rumours line-up was always guaranteed by the fact that the three writers are very different. It’s sad that only a few of the current bands seem to achieve this kind of diversity.

I hope she continues to grow and mature, but I don't see a necessity to change dramatically, when what she's doing already appeals (and speaks to) so many people.

I’m not talking about dramatic changes either. Just something that would be a relief for me between all that seriousness would be fine.

Originally posted by chiliD Hmmmmm...interesting. I hear more of a leap from Law & Order to Mirage to Go Insane than I do from Go Insane onward; and actually Say You Will (or Gift Of Screws) is more of a step BACKWARDS to Tusk yet keeping SOME essences of Out Of The Cradle

Actually I agree with this. The only criticism I can throw on Out Of The Cradle is that Lindsey’s playful side isn’t too obvious on it. Gift Of Screws solved this problem, and therefore feels more diverse. Law And Order still has the spontaneous vibe but on Mirage Lindsey begins to combine that vibe with the sophisticated arrangements of Rumours. Go Insane abandons the spontaneity altogether.

It just seems I can’t tone down. I’m approaching Lindsey’s level in anal retentiveness. :)

[Johnny Stew]

Originally posted by face of glass
If someone starts telling me that Joni Mitchell’s guitar playing talent and singing technique both prevent her from exposing her psyche, then I would call that person seriously biased. In fact, you could also turn this completely around. What if she actually wanted to do something different for a change, what if her heart and psyche told her to do that? She wouldn’t be able to do it, because she has limited musical skills.Certainly one can have a very honest and forthright writing style, and be a terrific guitarist, too... I just wanted to point out that there are certain things that make Stevie totally unique in the musical world, and I feel those natural talents are too precious to be altered.

Maybe becoming proficient on the guitar or the piano, would have expanded her horizons... but perhaps it may have bogged her down.
(For example, Madonna took guitar lessons a couple of years ago, and has become quite adept at playing... but can anyone say that her current songs are better than, say, the songs on 'Like A Prayer,' when she was relying more on instinct to write, rather than musical knowledge?)
She seriously limited her audience to a certain point, I believe.Quite possible... but then, by the same token, Joni, Carole, Rickie Lee, etc., have never had the extended level of commercial success that Stevie has had.
So it's one of those "apples & oranges" kinds of things.
If her skills haven’t worsened in songwriting, then how come her post-‘70s material hasn’t been good enough for other performers? Why do they think “Landslide” is better than “When I See You Again”?I'm not a good one to ask this, because I actually prefer "When I See You Again" to "Landslide."
The latter is an amazing song, of course, but the former moves me in such a major way, that I still feel that song hours after I've listened to it.
For me, that's definitely the sign of a truly incredible song.

At any rate... i don't really see people covering the later works of Dylan, or Springsteen, or Joni Mitchell, either.
And beyond "Go Your Own Way," the 'Rumours' tribute, and Camper Van Beethoven's cover of the 'Tusk' album... how many people have covered Lindsey's stuff?
So I don't really think that's any kind of indication that the appeal of Stevie's songs has dropped.
I think people just tend to cover songs they consider "classics" that have an appeal to the broadest audience possible... and "Landslide" is definitely a classic with broad appeal.

I feel Stevie is still a tremendous writer... and, in many ways, even better than she was before.
And I can say that, because I know that if she weren't, I would have lost interest years ago. :)

[dissention]

This is just what I think on why people don't cover much Stevie stuff:

IT IS NOT THEIR STYLE AND THEY'D LOOK RIDICULOUS DOING SO!

No one can cover a Stevie Nicks song and make it their own, be it an older song by Stevie or a newer one. Could you picture *anyone* covering Trouble In Shangri-La and molding it to their image and style? I think not. Same goes for RTTG or Rooms On Fire or No Spoken Word or Sable On Blonde or Outside the Rain...the list goes on and on. I can just see Christina Aguilera belting out "Never did I mean to imprison you...here in my garden, like I am in prison!!"

Other artists would just look ridiculous doing her material. Her old stuff hasn't even really been covered (with the exception of Landslide, a dance version of Edge of 17, Dreams, and Gold Dust Woman) by anyone else because no one could cover a song like Sisters of the Moon or Rhiannon and get away with it; they would look ridiculous. We all know how well Hole's version of GDW went over...like a lead-balloon. Just because someone doesn't cover another artist's music, it doesn't mean that the artist doesn't put out good material. Aimee Mann puts out amazing material, but NO ONE covers it at all. Lindsey, as Johnny pointed out, is one of the most amazing musicians but NO ONE covers his stuff. To deduce that Lindsey and Stevie don't put out good stuff because no one covers it is ludicrous to me.

[seeker007nmss]

Originally posted by dissention
This is just what I think on why people don't cover much Stevie stuff:

IT IS NOT THEIR STYLE AND THEY'D LOOK RIDICULOUS DOING SO!

No one can cover a Stevie Nicks song and make it their own, be it an older song by Stevie or a newer one.


Oh come on! You can't tell me that the Rod Stewart version of Stand Back isn't a keeper! LOL And who can forget the Rhianon Disco/club mix version? And the Waylon Jennings version of Rhianon.....what more can I say? (and when he teamed up with willie Nelson to do Gold Dust Women....)

Seriously, though, there are a few interesting interpretations of Stevie stuff out there. I like some of the Tori Amos covers, and there is a string quartet cd of rumours, that is kinda cool.

I think Landslide is the most covered. I know of several groups/artists that have tried it out. (Dixie Chick's weren't the first by any means)

My favorite use of Stevie songs still has to be The Lucy Lawless Skit on SNL. Cracks me up everytime. :laugh:

[seeker007nmss]

Originally posted by face of glass

I don’t overlook them, or at least I like to think so myself. I have a significant amount of albums by Joni Mitchell, Carole King, Patti Smith, Rickie Lee Jones, Kate Bush, Bjork (if you can’t handle umlauts), etc. I enjoy them just as much as the cream of the male artists.



Just a side note, What ever happened to Kate? I have a bunch of her stuff, she seems to just have fallen off of the earth. Kinda sad. She is one I would like to see in concert soemtime (but since she won't/ralrely flies I doubt she will make it to the States anytime soon).

Just wondering if anyone knows.

[dissention]

Originally posted by seeker007nmss
Oh come on! You can't tell me that the Rod Stewart version of Stand Back isn't a keeper! LOL

:eek: :eek: :eek:

I've never recovered from hearing that. :distress: Never.

:laugh:

[face of glass]

Originally posted by Johnny Stew
Certainly one can have a very honest and forthright writing style, and be a terrific guitarist, too... I just wanted to point out that there are certain things that make Stevie totally unique in the musical world, and I feel those natural talents are too precious to be altered.
Maybe becoming proficient on the guitar or the piano, would have expanded her horizons... but perhaps it may have bogged her down.

Actually I’m agreeing with this. Stevie does have limitations and it’s probably way too late to change her ways of writing at this point in her life. I still think she’s gone in the most important (for me) area of songwriting, the stuff you can put down as notes on paper. I find it a miracle that she did fine work in the ‘70s almost constantly despite her limitations.
However, if she diversified her style, the changes might not suite her in the end. It’s better for the producers to change her songs. There are things in Stevie’s style that just can’t be altered. I explained why I listen to her music just for certain occasions, for certain emotional states. She’s limited, yes. That’s why I’ll never put her on the ultimate songwriting pedestal. But there’s no one like Stevie in the end, and God knows what would happen if she tried to change the way I suggested. ;)

Quite possible... but then, by the same token, Joni, Carole, Rickie Lee, etc., have never had the extended level of commercial success that Stevie has had.
So it's one of those "apples & oranges" kinds of things.

True. They all have a peak period that’s shorter than Stevie’s, but then again at least Carole and Joni both released more songs during that time than Stevie during a period of similar length. Joni received eight gold records between 1970-1978 and Carole King had seven. After that they obviously burnt out in the eyes of the public. Now, is Stevie burnt out too, because she couldn’t keep the eight million people that bought Bella Donna as her core audience all the way? It really doesn’t matter what I think, it matters what the public thinks in the end. If people would think that TISL equalled her earlier writing, they would have bought the album. But they seem to think she’s not on that level. I believe TISL received the right promotion, but people just didn’t buy it. Of course there is a gap in my theory, “Sorcerer” and “POTU” were promoted heavily after all. So it could be that I’m just wrong here.

Another point. If Stevie usually writes a lot of music then how come she doesn’t offer it to other people? She knows that some of her songs will stay in the can forever, so why doesn’t she offer these to others? I think it’s because she believes there wouldn’t be anything interesting to offer for other people. Hold on, Dissention, you will get your due soon. ;)

I'm not a good one to ask this, because I actually prefer "When I See You Again" to "Landslide."
The latter is an amazing song, of course, but the former moves me in such a major way, that I still feel that song hours after I've listened to it.
For me, that's definitely the sign of a truly incredible song.

I like “When I See You Again” too, even though I consider it among her worst work within Fleetwood Mac. It’s very, very simple and that’s probably just the reason why it works. Lindsey obviously didn’t want to tamper with it (due to the circumstances), so he didn’t add any of his usual quirks in there, except for the guitar solo. Because he didn’t do that, it has a simplicity that no other Rumours line-up song has. But if there was any more of Stevie’s work this barebones on a Fleetwood Mac album, I would most likely skip those tracks.

At any rate... i don't really see people covering the later works of Dylan, or Springsteen, or Joni Mitchell, either.
And beyond "Go Your Own Way," the 'Rumours' tribute, and Camper Van Beethoven's cover of the 'Tusk' album... how many people have covered Lindsey's stuff?
So I don't really think that's any kind of indication that the appeal of Stevie's songs has dropped.
I think people just tend to cover songs they consider "classics" that have an appeal to the broadest audience possible... and "Landslide" is definitely a classic with broad appeal.

I did write a list of Dylan covers from his “regressive period” in this thread, but it obviously didn’t convince you. And I understand that, because it might be difficult to come up with another list for someone whose popularity is/has been worthy of Stevie’s success.
And I still think Lindsey has been ignored by the public after Rumours almost totally. We can’t really use him here, because his popularity hasn’t been even close to Stevie’s.
There is a good point your last paragraph. There’s this mentality: “it’s better to cover a good old song than make a bad new original”. And also, no matter how good work a writer can do these days, he/she still might be ignored because people think it’s not the same good old stuff anyway. I believe it’s also because rock’n’roll isn’t what it used to be in people’s eyes. Someone once said: “computer games are the new rock’n’roll”, and it might just be true. Nothing really new has been invented in rock since the ‘70s, or at least this new hasn’t had any wide success. If this is true, then it’s probably not Stevie who’s going downhill, it’s the entire rock’n’roll business. It’s dying a slow and painful death.
I still think Stevie hasn’t changed myself. But then again the rock’n’roll dinosaur likes what has gone before, because it can earn more money that way. The newer things, even by an old favourite, don’t really interest it.

Originally posted by dissention
This is just what I think on why people don't cover much Stevie stuff:

IT IS NOT THEIR STYLE AND THEY'D LOOK RIDICULOUS DOING SO!

No one can cover a Stevie Nicks song and make it their own, be it an older song by Stevie or a newer one. Could you picture *anyone* covering Trouble In Shangri-La and molding it to their image and style? I think not. Same goes for RTTG or Rooms On Fire or No Spoken Word or Sable On Blonde or Outside the Rain...the list goes on and on.

Other artists would just look ridiculous doing her material. Her old stuff hasn't even really been covered (with the exception of Landslide, a dance version of Edge of 17, Dreams, and Gold Dust Woman) by anyone else because no one could cover a song like Sisters of the Moon or Rhiannon and get away with it; they would look ridiculous. We all know how well Hole's version of GDW went over...like a lead-balloon. Just because someone doesn't cover another artist's music, it doesn't mean that the artist doesn't put out good material.
[/QUOTE]

Somehow I agree with this too. I said earlier, that with an “atmospheric artist” like Stevie, you have to take the lyrics, the voice, the arrangement and the notes on the paper all together to truly enjoy it. And this is why I think her own versions of her songs are always the definitive ones.
The thing is, if someone thought a particular Stevie song was great and wanted to cover it, then he/she would have to take out the lyrics, the arrangement and the voice. The chords and notes Stevie chose for the vocal melody would remain. How come then, if she’s such a great songwriter, it isn’t happening? Because I believe there wouldn’t be a good song left, if we’re speaking of her post-‘70s work. That’s her problem in the end. A Nickssong isn’t really that adaptable. You can’t change it like you can change a Bob Dylan song. And that’s why I won’t consider her “the greatest songwriter of all time”, although I think many of you do so. The elements of Stevie’s songs, I’m sure, feel very inseparable for many people and that’s why there simply isn’t that many covers of them. Does this then mean that her writing has gone down? Probably not. But it has become difficult for people to cover her songs. That also, can be seen as a sign of getting worse in songwriting.

To deduce that Lindsey and Stevie don't put out good stuff because no one covers it is ludicrous to me.

I didn’t want it to come off that way. I love SYW and I like TISL a lot. I was just trying to say that the foundations of Stevie’s songwriting don’t seem as fresh to me as they once were.

Originally posted by seeker007nmss
Just a side note, What ever happened to Kate? I have a bunch of her stuff, she seems to just have fallen off of the earth. Kinda sad. She is one I would like to see in concert soemtime (but since she won't/ralrely flies I doubt she will make it to the States anytime soon).

Kate was supposed to have a new album coming out this very month, but it’s obviously been pushed back. Pauseandplay.com still says it might come out this year, but I’m doubting it.
Kate tried touring in her earlier days (this is documented on the vinyl only “Kate Bush On Stage” EP). However, the experience of touring was obviously so bad for her that she stopped doing it. Unfortunately.

Whoah. A shorter post this time. ;) Maybe I’m a bit tired of this debate, since I’m obviously starting to give in on some issues. :)

[Johnny Stew]

Originally posted by face of glass
They all have a peak period that’s shorter than Stevie’s, but then again at least Carole and Joni both released more songs during that time than Stevie during a period of similar length. Joni received eight gold records between 1970-1978 and Carole King had seven. After that they obviously burnt out in the eyes of the public. Now, is Stevie burnt out too, because she couldn’t keep the eight million people that bought Bella Donna as her core audience all the way? It really doesn’t matter what I think, it matters what the public thinks in the end. If people would think that TISL equalled her earlier writing, they would have bought the album. But they seem to think she’s not on that level. I believe TISL received the right promotion, but people just didn’t buy it. Of course there is a gap in my theory, “Sorcerer” and “POTU” were promoted heavily after all. So it could be that I’m just wrong here.'Trouble In Shangri-La' has sold 638,000 copies... which is nothing to sneeze at.
Certainly it's not in league with the millions of copies her first three albums sold, but by all accounts, it was far better than Warner Bros. had hoped it would do.

I don't really think it's fair to compare Stevie's current album sales with those of 20+ years ago.
There really isn't any major artist who's still selling as many albums now on a regular basis as they did 20 years ago, with Springsteen being probably the most notable exception.
(And, of course, a couple of "out-of-left-field" surprises, like Santana's 'Supernatural,' or Cher's 'Believe'... but their follow-up albums couldn't come close to the sales of the prior releases.)

The musical landscape has just changed way too much for Stevie to sell millions of albums these days. And, for that matter, Fleetwood Mac.... who arguably released one of their best albums ever this year.

Another point. If Stevie usually writes a lot of music then how come she doesn’t offer it to other people? She knows that some of her songs will stay in the can forever, so why doesn’t she offer these to others?Well, "Leather And Lace" was originally written for Waylon Jennings & Jessi Colter... also, "If You Ever Did Believe" was given to Louise Goffin (Carole King's daughter), and "Sorcerer" to Marilyn Martin... long before Stevie recorded her own versions.
She also gave "You Like Me" to the Williams Brothers, and she's never released her own version of that one (much to my disappointment).

I tend to think, given that Stevie's songs are so intensely personal to her, and she's so protective of them, that perhaps she'd rather a song go unreleased, than run the risk of it being butchered by someone else.
But who knows?

[blinker12]

Stevie herself joins this debate in the "Sex, Drugs and Stevie Nicks" interview published a few days ago in the Australian Courier-Herald:

"[F]rom 1986 to 1993, I wrote nothing memorable, I did nothing memorable. I sat in my house and gained weight."

I think this is an incredibly honest self-assessment; if you look at her songs from those years, there's really almost nothing memorable. "Seven Wonders" is probably the best thing she recorded, and she didn't even write it.

[face of glass]

Originally posted by Johnny Stew
'Trouble In Shangri-La' has sold 638,000 copies... which is nothing to sneeze at.
Certainly it's not in league with the millions of copies her first three albums sold, but by all accounts, it was far better than Warner Bros. had hoped it would do.

I don't really think it's fair to compare Stevie's current album sales with those of 20+ years ago.
There really isn't any major artist who's still selling as many albums now on a regular basis as they did 20 years ago, with Springsteen being probably the most notable exception.
(And, of course, a couple of "out-of-left-field" surprises, like Santana's 'Supernatural,' or Cher's 'Believe'... but their follow-up albums couldn't come close to the sales of the prior releases.)

The musical landscape has just changed way too much for Stevie to sell millions of albums these days. And, for that matter, Fleetwood Mac.... who arguably released one of their best albums ever this year.

I do respect TISL’s sale figures. It’s pretty close the amount that Joni & Carole used to sell in the ‘70s (of a single album, I mean). Those days one sold a lot less than these days.
And no, I don’t think it’s fair to compare the sale figures of Bella Donna to those of Street Angel or TISL. The times have changed. I guess Madonna still sells a bit more than Stevie these days, but she’s had to resort to publicity stunts along the way. When she decided to go “spiritual” on Ray Of Light, even that was a publicity stunt, although nothing too shocking.
The thing I really respect in Stevie is that she hasn’t gone that far. She doesn’t need to kiss another woman in a Music Television gala (has she even attended these for a long time?). She’s always let the music come first. Although she has her image, it doesn’t come off as completely calculated.

The landscape has changed. Springsteen acts as a musical therapist for the US of A. Fleetwood Mac doesn’t do that. They still let the music come first, although the shows may be pre-planned etc. Even Santana and Cher didn’t really have too much of their old stylistics left when they “came back”. They went for a straight modernization. TISL sounds contemporary, but not by that much. Which is good as far as I’m concerned.

Thank you for that “list of covers”. I wasn’t aware of these.

I tend to think, given that Stevie's songs are so intensely personal to her, and she's so protective of them, that perhaps she'd rather a song go unreleased, than run the risk of it being butchered by someone else.
But who knows?

Probably you’re right. I bet she sits on her demos with a shotgun in her hand these days. Her songs tend to be private thoughts in the end, almost like diaries. But it also might be that she knows that her recent writing is more like poems than songs.

To summarize then:

I can’t really use the cover argument too efficiently. I still think that a Stevie song could be covered these days too, if someone liked the actual musical structures in it. I’m sure that in the ‘60s a lot of Bob Dylan fans thought that Bob’s songs just couldn’t be covered, that they would lose something, just like we think of Stevie’s songs. A phrase like “Take me on a trip upon your magic swirlin' ship, my senses have been stripped, my hands can't feel to grip, my toes too numb to step, wait only for my boot heels to be wanderin' was thought to be only Dylan’s property. When the Byrds did their radical two-minute take on “Mr. Tambourine Man”, they shocked everybody. After that Bob’s songs were radically altered by a lot of people. Take Hendrix’s “All Along The Watchtower” or “Father Of Day, Father Of Night” by Manfred Mann’s Earth Band, for instance. However, you can’t do that with Stevie really. The ‘70s songs have been covered, but only probably because it’s seen as “the classic period”. No radical rearrangements though, although I can’t know for sure of Walter Egan’s “Sisters Of The Moon”. That’s Stevie’s biggest weakness in the end, only a skilled specialist could separate the lyrics and the music from post-Wild Heart work. When the musical structures weaken, only the hardcore fans are the most likely to remain interested, if the songs are not arranged/produced well.

That article “Sex, drugs and Stevie Nicks” is a fascinating read. She’s maybe a bit too blunt to herself when she says that she wrote nothing memorable from 1986 to 1993. Some of you might actually agree with this, but then again most of you think she’s recovered and her work these days equals “the classics”. I do not have any objective statements to back up my feelings in this, no one has. But I do think that if Stevie’s songwriting then and Stevie’s songwriting now was to be compared, then it would have to be done in the following way: release the ‘70s demos on an album with the barest of arrangements. Put the later demos on another album and release it at the same time. I do think that the album with the recent demos on them would flop. But there wouldn’t be complete objectivity then either. You might claim that the later demos are more modern and wouldn’t work if someone released them in the ‘70s climate, or that the ‘70s music would be out of touch with the times. However, I can’t think of any other way here.

In the end, it’s the Nicksian drone that remains. It’s never really changed in my opinion and I wouldn’t want to struggle to the point where I start hearing subtle differences. That’s the point I would become a hardcore fan. I’ve made clear why I won’t want to listen to Stevie’s demos that much unless she starts doing something that seems unusual for me too. In the end it doesn’t matter though. She hasn’t intended those for us to hear. She wants us to hear the studio recordings. And in that area I haven’t had any huge complaint. Those are the ones I’m always looking forward to hear, even when she’s in the rocking chair in her 80s singing into the studio mike and her voice has once again started to resemble the “When I See You Again” tone. :)

[after reading blinker12’s post]:

Originally posted by blinker12
I think this is an incredibly honest self-assessment; if you look at her songs from those years, there's really almost nothing memorable. "Seven Wonders" is probably the best thing she recorded, and she didn't even write it.

It may be so. However, her lyric writing has always remained strong, and in my opinion it didn’t really go down during those years.

[face of glass]

Oh, and just one other thing. I could compare hearing differences in Stevie's recent demos to hearing differences in Fleetwood Mac concerts these days. But that would be just being mean. ;)

[Johnny Stew]

Originally posted by blinker12
Stevie herself joins this debate in the "Sex, Drugs and Stevie Nicks" interview published a few days ago in the Australian Courier-Herald:

"[F]rom 1986 to 1993, I wrote nothing memorable, I did nothing memorable. I sat in my house and gained weight."

I think this is an incredibly honest self-assessment; if you look at her songs from those years, there's really almost nothing memorable. "Seven Wonders" is probably the best thing she recorded, and she didn't even write it. It bothers me that she feels this way, and I'm hoping she's just generalizing... because in my opinion, she has some really great songs from that time period.
There are definitely some clunkers in there, but that whole era is not a complete wash, by any means.

[dissention]

Originally posted by Johnny Stew
It bothers me that she feels this way, and I'm hoping she's just generalizing... because in my opinion, she has some really great songs from that time period.
There are definitely some clunkers in there, but that whole era is not a complete wash, by any means.

I posted some of this in another thread, but I figured I'd post it here, too:

I think what she's saying is that when you put her work from '86-'93 up against her earlier work, it paled in comparison. And it does. Sister Honey doesn't compare to Edge of Seventeen, Listen To the Rain doesn't stack up with Sable On Blonde, Fire Burning doesn't match up with Storms quality-wise. Not everything was bad, but everything wasn't what it could've been.

You have to put yourself in Stevie's place. She's probably viewing it as 'Here I am, a songwriter who wrote masterpieces like Sara and Gold Dust Woman who degenerated into writing songs like WTTR...S and Love Is Like A River. Something was wrong.' While us fans might like such mediocre songs, the person who is going through the hardships and writing the songs may feel sad and discouraged because they know they could write better under different circumstances. Some might view a song like WISYA as a masterpiece, while Stevie might view it as garbage because she looks at it and thinks of what it could have been had she not had so many problems. It's like, if you were Van Gogh, got involved in some heavy stuff and you couldn't produce such wonderful work like before; the artist in you will feel awful and unsatisfied. I think it was pretty self-explanatory that she wasn't happy with that period in her career because she doesn't perform any of the songs from that period live anymore, also.

Just some thoughts. :)

[face of glass]

I think she's being too hard on herself. If she means her music, I might agree, if she means her lyrics, I won't. She still did some good songs during that period, even if they were mainly co-writes/ghost-writes.

Then again, even Lindsey looked back on Mirage with regret during the Tango In The Night interviews. I hope they won't be sorry about doing Say You Will.

And of course Lindsey always says of his current work that "it's the best work I've ever done". Wonder why he doesn't use other musician cliches like: "I'm just doing what I want and if someone likes it it's a bonus". ;) But, no musician ever sells the latest works by saying it's a way to pay the alimonies of three kids or something like that.

[dissention]

Originally posted by face of glass
I think she's being too hard on herself.

See, I don't understand that. :laugh:

I don't think she's being too hard on herself at all. She's the artist and the creative one and I think it's obvious as to why she feels this way. She wasn't as creative or confident in her abilities and it showed through in the music. She's acknowledged this and I'd be upset, too, if my baby, my love suffered because of mistakes I made in my life. That's just the way I feel, of course.

Her art was the one thing she had complete control over and when some of that control was taken away, it suffered. She is speaking form her heart when she says she's unhappy with her art during that era because it doesn't stack up. :)

PS: I don't think Lindsey ever said that Mirage was his best work. It stunk. :laugh:

[face of glass]

Originally posted by dissention
Her art was the one thing she had complete control over and when some of that control was taken away, it suffered. She is speaking form her heart when she says she's unhappy with her art during that era because it doesn't stack up. :)

Well, I think she’s biased. And you are obviously too. ;)

PS: I don't think Lindsey ever said that Mirage was his best work. It stunk. :laugh:

I don’t think he badmouthed the album when it was released. Even Stevie said of Street Angel when she was promoting it: “I quite like this album”. ;)

Note: Mirage rules, as the international laws have stated since 1982. Any negative comments about that album will be interpreted as foolhardy trolling. ;)

[dissention]

Originally posted by face of glass
Well, I think she’s biased. And you are obviously too. ;)

I don’t think he badmouthed the album when it was released. Even Stevie said of Street Angel when she was promoting it: “I quite like this album”. ;)

Note: Mirage rules, as the international laws have stated since 1982. Any negative comments about that album will be interpreted as foolhardy trolling. ;)

I'm not biased at all, I just call out lackluster work as I see it. ;)

If international laws say that Mirage rules, I'd be interested in finding out if a Bush had some part in making those laws. ;) :D

[face of glass]

Originally posted by dissention
If international laws say that Mirage rules, I'd be interested in finding out if a Bush had some part in making those laws. ;) :D

:laugh: You go George!

[darklinensuit]

In his wisdom, Bush has not put international rock music law into the platform. Not after his father made that comment about being a big fan of the Nitty Gritty Ditty Great Bird Band.:laugh:

- Jake