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

Hey folks,

I'm sure most of us have seen this article:

http://music-mix.ew.com/2009/03/stevie-nicks-in.html

If not, it's an absolute treat. Lots of very candid comments from Ms Nicks, and some valuable insights into some tracks and some things that happened. The Mick/Lindsey bits were the most interesting to me, hence the thread title..

Anyway, enjoy!

- Spike

Yes, yes, great interview. I love how Beauty & the Beast is about Mick, but then the story turns into a story about Lindsey.

I don't know. Do you think part of her reason for getting involved with Mick was to hurt Lindsey... or, rather, to see if it would hurt him?


When I hear the song, I hate to say it, but I always think of Lindsey as the Beast.

Thanks! I really enjoyed that.

What a great read. Thank you for sharing that with us. Incidentally, there's an interview with Stevie floating around on YouTube in which she said "Oh Daddy" was her favorite Christine song and "Stephanie" was her favorite song of Lindsey's.

-Matt

omg i totally agree that "Oh Daddy" is Christine's best song. And I think Stevie should do it on this tour!! :]

As for "Stephanie," how perverse. Yes it's beautiful, but he doesn't sing. I guess it's the one pure love song he wrote for her.

then, he turned it into "eyes of the world" :laugh:

Ah, here's the link to that aforementioned interview. Enjoy.

-Matt

"Oh Daddy" is a such a haunting masterwork. It should have been a hit. It happens to be my favorite Christine song as well, along with You Make Loving Fun.

I was surprised that Stevie chose "Stephanie" as her favorite Lindsey song, considering all of the great songs he had written after that one. Granted, I hardly expected her to declare "Go Your Own Way" her favorite, but... "Stephanie"? It is a good song, meditative, inspiring, perhaps intimate, but -- then again, good times, ahem.

-Matt

This perfectly describes so many of her songs:

We fans are always joking "wait, I thought she said that song was writtin for so&so, or it was about such&such." We usually don't take into consideration that some of it's added in/made up - not reality, not a true part of the history. :shrug:

Surely, you jest. That song is sacred and should never be touched by Gypsy Hands. Although, Stevie did kick ass on the harmonies that are displayed on the Rumors Reissue version....BUT NO LEAD VOCAL.

She has consistently said "Sara" is about more than one thing. I think people do not listen to what she actually says. Then, they call her inconsistent, contradictory, etc.

Of course your right here, Strand

But even those who DO listen to her, still can come to this conclusion. Because most of the time, she is.

1. I am always right - learn to live with it :wavey:

2. I think that while she, like anyone else, gets things like dates wrong every now and then, the vast majority of the stuff she says is consistent
and accurate. I think she says things in direct response to the actual question, withut context or background and people
Take it to mean a broader commentary than it actually is.

I'm afraid I must wholeheartedly disagree. I think Stevie could do a totally kick ass version of "Oh Daddy"' and they should try it out on this tour.

She's got the voice for it and I think, especially in light of her saying it is her favourite Christine song, she would treat it with love and respect and do her absolute best not to disappoint the fans or Christine.

Go for it Stevie!! Give "Oh Daddy" the Gypsy treatment!!:nod::nod::nod:

But you never answer your PMs.

I think she's a goofball.

I could have SWORN that Stevie mentioned in some article that the "if you build your house, I'll come by..." was about Henley building a house. :shocked: Anyone else remember reading that somewhere?

Um, okay, I won't. :rolleyes:

Don said that line was about him building his house first. Then, Us Magazine asked Stevie if it was true and Stevie said: "That is true. He did. And I was in it before he finished it."

Michele

So, it's true that she was in his house or that the song was written about him? LOL

Oh no, I think people do listen to her - and she does say different things each time. :laugh: It's true - she SEEMS to contradict herself with her varied stories. She's never before said "there are parts of songs that are totally made up, and have nothing to do with the story" that I've ever read. Now that she's specifically spelled it out for dummies like me, it makes total sense.:o

Like, just because she's said Sara is about Mick doesn't mean it's all about Mick, or all about Don, or all about anyone - parts are about this person, parts are about others, parts are total fiction. But some of us jump to the conclusion of "she said it's about Mick, she said it in 3 interviews!" We're so hungry for info about her songs, probably cuz many of them don't make much literal sense, that when we get any info about them we kind of tuck it away like the mystery has been solved.

Gypsy is a good example of this for me - I had ALWAYS heard that it was for/about Robin. Never once do I recall hearing the "before we made it, back when we were poor" story before this tour. :shrug: That's not to say that it wasn't patially about Robin, but until she explained it, I was rolling my eyes at the new story going "OK, since when Stevie?"

^

She has repeatedly said since 1982 that gypsy was about putting her bed on the floor, etc. :shrug:

Was she calling Mick a gorgeous rock star?
Cause, well...never mind.

I think it's true that Don was building a house and she was in it before he was finished. I really don't think she's ever said it was true that the song was about him. She has always said it was about everyone.

When it came out she said:

Now, I do think Don was right in the fetus direction he steered us for the "when there's a heart beat it never really dies" part. This tour, I've actually seen Stevie patting her abdomen for the heartbeat line.

Michele

Man, you guys are lucky- The Ledge is blocked from work for me!


"Oh Daddy"- I'm curious, but not eager, to see what Stevie would do with it (to it?). I don't think it would suit her vocal style well.

As for it being sacred- what about "Say You Love Me", is it sacred and not allowed in 'gypsy hands'?

Who said Stevie doesn't relate to her fans?

I really like this comment. I think it sums up the collective FM fan consciousness pretty well.

It also makes me think, given what we now know about Sara, what that 'complete' version would have been like. Or if it exists.

You don't think Mick "Two Sticks And A Drum" Fleetwood is gorgeous? :shrug:

- Spike

same.
stevie always goes on about who is really the beast etc, implicating herself.
so i've always thought she was the beast to Lindsey


Stevie tackling Oh Daddy... hmmmm
tis my fave CMcV song too, along with Isn't it Midnight
but i'd love to see her try it
if she can't do it, that's ok
CMcV will be so enraged, she flies on the first plane outta england
and joins the tour JUST for that song :D

When she was on drugs that probably was true.

It rings a bell, but I don't remember the whole "pretending to be poor" part or that she wrote it in the early 70's. I guess I must have blocked it out completely cuz I liked the Robin story better. :laugh:

I'm pretty sure she didn't say it was written in the seventies before, because I recall her pointing out that it was written when Robin was succumbing to leukemia.

But yeah, she was always all about the bed on the floor. San Francisco, etc.

Michele

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

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

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

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

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

Robin didn't die until October(?) 1982, which was about six months after Mirage was released, so there is no way that the "bright eyes" lines were written about her. In fact, I don't think any of it is about her. I assume that "Gypsy" is pretty much what Stevie has been telling us it is about in recent concerts- the desire to get back to her commune-living hippie slacker self after immense stardom, the stardom that was as improbable as lightning striking. "I still see your bright eyes," I think, refers to that remnant of her inner wide-eyed child- all that remains of her humble innocence. Ultimately it all comes down to her- she could either be a royal PITA high-flying narcicisstic bitch rock star, or she could stay grounded and remember the values of the life that she left behind. In hindsight, the death of ones own innocence could be compared to the death of a best friend, so perhaps that's where she took creative license regarding the song's true provenance.

^ I think she just said she wrote the "bright eyes" line when she found out Robin was sick, not when she died. SHE SAID IT SO IT MUST BE TRUE DAMMIT!:p

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

I do not think it was Robin's actual death, but the process of dying that inspired those lines. I also think it is entirely possible that the line "I still see your bright eyes" was written before then about something else. Then, when La Nicks was writing the song Gypsy, she pulled that line to work in the poem, thus changing its prior meaning.

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

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

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

Michele

I agree with you, surprise surprise.

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

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

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

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

I like your breakdown a lot!

Thanks!!!!

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

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

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

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