Bette Davis Eyes [Archive]

MarkMc1990

10-22-2011, 10:01 PM

mottabam

10-22-2011, 10:35 PM

I believe she was also offered "Call Me" and wasn't interested. At least Debbie Harry and Blondie made it a hit.

DefDumbandBlond

10-23-2011, 12:02 AM

I actually really like that song so I would have loved to hear Stevie sing it!

@mottabam Yeah, Giorgio Moroder offered Stevie the song first, then he offered it to Blondie and Debbie wrote her own lyrics for it. :)

Ghost_Tracker

10-23-2011, 12:20 AM

Would anyone else have loved to hear a Stevie demo of this 80's hit? I think it would have sounded so interesting hearing an '81 Stevie record this song. I know songs like these are usually offered to or sampled by many artists before one clinches the deal, I wonder if Stevie was ever in contention for it? Kind of like how she was offered "These Dreams" which ended up going to Heart.

For whatever it's worth, there was STRONG suspicion at the time this song came out that it was ABOUT Stevie! :) And that the woman shown in sillouette in the video is supposed to be her. :nod:

"All the boys - think she's a spy she's GOT - Bette Davis eyes -
she KNOWS you!..... and she knows JUST what it takes to make
a PRO blush! She's FEROCIOUS!.... "

P.S. - Speaking of Stevie doing a Heart cover, I think it would be amazing to see her cover "Barracuda" live.
She'd knock that out of the park, I bet! :) With Waddy on guitar.

mikephxaz

10-23-2011, 12:37 AM

The second song from Kim Carnes album, following the song Betty Davis Eyes is called Hit & Run...it would have been a great Stevie Nicks song....

THINKABOUTIT

10-23-2011, 12:55 AM

It boggles my mind how many songs Stevie was offered...or others that were written for her & she also turned down

"These Dreams"
"Running Down a Dream"
"Call Me"
etc..etc...

mikebise

10-23-2011, 08:43 AM

Giorgio Moroder offered Stevie an instrumental titled "Machine Man" to which she would have written her own lyrics. She would not have sung "Call Me", since those are Debbie's later lyrics after Stevie turned down the project. Stevie was busy with the Tusk tour and her own solo recording.

She did quote "Bette Davis Eyes" in a poem she wrote in 1986 on the Rock A Little Tour. She even quotes the "Bette Davis Eyes" video, with the "Slap slap! Slap!" part. (Yes, Stevie types out the "Slap"s!).

drzubritsky

10-23-2011, 08:57 AM

The Kim Carnes version of "Bette Davis Eyes" is a cover version of a song that originally appeared on a Jackie DeShannon (the song's co-writer) album in 1974. So it wasn't a situation of "Bette Davis Eyes" being a hot new song making the rounds with singers vying to nab it.

I doubt that a Stevie version would have been as good as Kim Carnes'. Val Garay's production of the track was very striking and creative at the time. Stevie and Jimmy Iovine were in a very conventional L.A. rock mode at the time, and probably wouldn't have come up with nearly as memorable a treatment.

mikebise

10-23-2011, 11:03 AM

drzubritsky

10-23-2011, 11:54 AM

Yeah, people were calling Kim "New Wave" at the time because of the production of "Bette Davis Eyes" and "Draw Of The Cards".

I kind of forgot about that, but, yes, "Bette Davis Eyes" was categorized by the mainstream as a "new wave" song, strange as that may seem today. Probably more of a reflection on the stale state of top 40 radio in the very late 70s/early 80s (prior to the arrival of MTV).

TerraRhiannon

10-23-2011, 12:45 PM

It boggles my mind how many songs Stevie was offered...or others that were written for her & she also turned down

"These Dreams"
"Running Down a Dream"
"Call Me"
etc..etc...

Was These Dreams a track or just lyrics? Cause I know Bernie Taupin and another guy wrote the lyrics, I was just wondering if Heart wrote the music for it.

I would so love to hear Stevie do a cover of These Dreams for fun, and Bette Davis eyes as well!

APerfectLie

10-23-2011, 02:40 PM

Was These Dreams a track or just lyrics? Cause I know Bernie Taupin and another guy wrote the lyrics, I was just wondering if Heart wrote the music for it.

I would so love to hear Stevie do a cover of These Dreams for fun, and Bette Davis eyes as well!

I don't know, but I know that Stevie turned it down because of the title being too close to "Dreams". Fast forward 30 years later :rolleyes:

TerraRhiannon

10-23-2011, 04:37 PM

I don't know, but I know that Stevie turned it down because of the title being too close to "Dreams". Fast forward 30 years later :rolleyes:

LOL

Well then. Now we know it's because she actually did hate the idea of the song at the time.... or the lyrics or something. 'to close to Dreams' was just an excuse.

Johnny Stew

10-23-2011, 04:45 PM

I don't know, but I know that Stevie turned it down because of the title being too close to "Dreams". Fast forward 30 years later :rolleyes:

It wasn't that the title was too close to "Dreams," she turned it down because the lyrics were too close to the kind of lyrics she wrote herself. Which makes sense -- after all, why sing someone else's approximation of your own lyrical style?

TerraRhiannon

10-23-2011, 04:51 PM

It wasn't that the title was too close to "Dreams," she turned it down because the lyrics were too close to the kind of lyrics she wrote herself. Which makes sense -- after all, why sing someone else's approximation of your own lyrical style?

Uh I suppose, but why record a song with lyrics that are nothing like the lyrics you would write. Then it wouldn't sound like your song :) What I'm trying to say is, a lot of Stevie's songs were written by other people, so she probably wouldn't have recorded them if they didn't sound a little like her song writing.

Maybe that doesn't make sense. Hmm.

mikephxaz

10-23-2011, 04:53 PM

Yeah, people were calling Kim "New Wave" at the time because of the production of "Bette Davis Eyes" and "Draw Of The Cards".

But Stevie obviously loved Kim's version of it (and the video!), if she wrote about it in her poetry.

Its interesting because Bette Davis Eyes and Draw of the Cards were not at all representative of the rest of the album or Kim's other music...they tried to make her into something more NewWave with her releases BDE, DOTC and then later Crazy in the Night and Voyeur

mikebise

10-23-2011, 05:30 PM

Macfanforever

10-23-2011, 06:01 PM

I remember back in the day before Napster and those other PtoP sites were shut down.The people post Bette Davis Eyes and Bonnie Tyler's tunes with Stevie's name on the tunes.She got cedit for them.

michelej1

10-23-2011, 06:07 PM

Uh I suppose, but why record a song with lyrics that are nothing like the lyrics you would write. Then it wouldn't sound like your song :)

I agree. That's why I'd take Some Become Strangers over Seven Wonders any day of the week. And don't even talk to me about SIAB.

Michele

mikephxaz

10-23-2011, 07:17 PM

Voyeur is the freshest, most modern-sounding album of 1982. I still feel that way 29 years later. 10 perfect songs and performances in a seamless collection.

NO ONE got that album and how incredible it was...

I would agree until the last four songs..thrill of the grill sounds like a Burger King commercial and Merc Man sonunds like a blatant attempt to have a huge single, that fell short....the first six songs are soooo great!

tabruns

10-23-2011, 10:43 PM

The fact is none of us has any idea why Nicks turned down various songs, unless she says specifically why she did in an interview. I'm not aware that she ever said why she turned down "These Dreams". Turned out okay anyway, Heart did a great job with it.

So is In Your Dreams her first solo album without any songs on it that Nicks didn't write?

Johnny Stew

10-24-2011, 12:05 AM

Uh I suppose, but why record a song with lyrics that are nothing like the lyrics you would write. Then it wouldn't sound like your song :)

But that's pretty much the idea -- if it's just going to sound like a song you wrote anyway, why not fill that slot on the album with a song you wrote? The same reason has been given for why "Stop Draggin' My Heart Around" was favored over "Insider." The latter sounded more in line with Stevie's own lyrics, while the lyrics to the former added a different flavor to 'Bella Donna' that Stevie herself couldn't.

Basically, "These Dreams" sounded too much like a "Stevie Nicks" song.

Macfanforever

10-24-2011, 12:23 AM

As we know she like to write her own tunes and sing her own,just in the last decade she started to sing covers at the concerts.which is great.but some of the covers she did are not my faves for the original artists.but she did an awesome job on them.Like Led Zeps "Rock and Roll".I love Kim Carnes music .I love to hear Stevie do covers of Kim's tunes then what Stevie picked for covers on tours.

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I would love to hear Stevie do this one.

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Mentioned before .This Bonnie Tyler classic.

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MarkMc1990

10-24-2011, 03:29 AM

What was the poem she quoted it in?

PolishStevieFan

10-24-2011, 08:12 AM

I love this song! And I love Kim Carnes...I think her voice is perfect match for this song (at least in this new wave arrangement). "Bette Davis Eyes" was such a great hit single, one of the most memorable songs of the 80's. But seriously, I don't think that Stevie should record this song. She's much better off singing her own material. For me, "Bette Davis Eyes" is Carnes' signature song and no one, I mean no one can touch it. By the way, few months ago I bought Carnes' compilation and must say she had far more great songs, like "Rough Edges" and "Voyeur".