Jimmy Iovine talks Stevie Nicks on Howard Stern today
 

Jimmy was on Stern this morning promoting his movie on HBO. Howard went through his career and of course Stevie Nicks was a hot topic. I will paraphrase most of what he said and I am sure the full interview will be on youtube soon.
Jimmy loved Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers. When he was hired to do Damn the Torpedoes he worked his butt off making it the incredible record that it is. He said Tom really was not into it for the money and Jimmy was like you are supposed to be a rock star and make lots of money. He butted heads with Tom's drummer because he could never seem to do it the way Jimmy wanted.
When Stevie hired him to do Bella Donna he was afraid. Everyone told Jimmy that Stevie was only good enough for about 3 songs on an album and could not sing an entire album. He felt incredible pressure to suddenly be Lindsey Buckingham and turn her writing and songs into good music. Jimmy and Stevie fell for eachother right away and Stevie moved in his house. Jimmy had to keep the Stevie relationship secret from Tom Petty. Not because Tom wanted Stevie but because Tom wanted Jimmy to work full time on his music and not be distracted. Every time Tom came over Jimmy's house, Stevie would hide in the basement and listen to the music. When Bella Donna was finished Jimmy told Stevie up front that its a good album but no one is going to listen to it no matter how many candles or crystals you put on the album cover. The album needed a single. He instantly thought of SDMHA, a song Tom shelved because they he did not think it was a single. Jimmy thought the idea of a woman singing these tough guy lyrics would be the perfect song. They cut the song and added it to Bella Donna. The song was a huge success and Tom got pissed. This forever changed Tom and Jimmy's relationship. Tom felt betrayed that his song was used to launch Stevie and her record became more popular than his. Tom jokes about it today saying the song bought him a new house in 1981. However this soured their relationship and Jimmy expressed regret in the way he coordinated this song. In some ways Tom felt his song was stolen. Jimmy says that Stevie dumped him shortly after the release of Bella Donna and it hurt him. They are best friends today and Stevie went to his wedding. Jimmy says he is socially awkward and really only socializes in recording studios. Jimmy saw Stevie become a huge star and acknowledged that her life got out of control.

Jimmy really loved working with raw talent Stevie and Tom. Later in his career when he worked with established artists Bob Segar and U2 it was not as much fun.

I wish Howard asked about the Rock A Little project. I bet Jimmy could tell the most amazing stories ever. Great interview with this legend if you can catch it.

This is interesting. In her liner notes for the deluxe edition of Bella Donna she portrays it that when she left after the end of her short BD tour to join up with FM in France to record Mirage, Jimmy came with her. He intended to stay 10 days but he and Lindsey got into a nasty fight (I can imagine Lindsey making all sorts of snarky, caustic remarks intended to provoke.... I can imagine her possibly making remarks of her own to LB....:shrug:) anyway Jimmy found it intolerable and left after just a day or so. And the way she writes it, she was like "Is that it? It's over just like that??" Implying that his leaving ended the relationship....... Of course the notes pick up on the Wild Heart re release and talk about how they resumed their relationship but not like before; they did not live together.

So the truth is out there somewhere..........

He left France but when Stevie came back to the states is probably when she dumped him. He mentioned that Joe Walsh was her next boyfriend and that was 1983.

Stevie possibly exaggerating?? What a shock!!

Here is the link to Jimmy describing hiding Stevie Nicks in the basement
https://www.howardstern.com/show/201...-his-basement/

Tom needs to grow up
 

Seems pretty childish of Tom Petty to feel like he was betrayed after Stevie had a big hit with SDMHA. He didn't want the song on his album, and he was willing to record it with Stevie for Bella Donna, so why the sour grapes?

:laugh: That's great stuff. Thanks for putting it up!

yes, but that timeline totally ignores the fact that she married Kim in between all that....

She and Jimmy were together during the making of Wild Heart, but not living together the way they had during BD. That would have been 1982 into 83. Then in the beginning of 83 she married Kim, and they divorced that summer but she talked about the marriage being over before the tour even started in interviews. She hooked up with Joe during the tour for WH.

interestingly there's a series of photos of Stevie with both Kim and Jimmy at some awards (American Music? Grammy's?? not sure) -- she's in her all white stage clothes and Jimmy is in an all-white tux and she seems to be on Jimmy's arm, not Kim's, in nearly all of them. I always found that interesting....

(she broke up with Hernan Rojas before going out on the Tusk tour and she said in an interview when she was seeing Paul Fishkin that she wasn't interested in playing around but she gets very lonely on the road...... "read between my lines" on that one.....)

uhh! She never stayed lonely for too long, just saying..

You could almost say that for every member of this band, couldn't you? Just sayin' . . :laugh:

Just out of curiosity, out of her many boyfriends...did any dump her?

Not really when you think about it and hear the full interview. Jimmy admits he handled the situation wrong. It was not like Jimmy or Stevie were out shopping for a single. Jimmy came right for this song. Go back in time. Its spring 1981 and Tom Petty releases Hard Promises....the follow up to the smash Damn the Torpedoes. Jimmy was working on both albums. In less than 2 months Bella Donna is released and eclipses Hard Promises. Tom sees Hard Promises a success but nowhere near the success of his prior album. How could he not think WHAT IF SDMHA was the lead off his album. Its not that Tom did not like the song. Tom and Jimmy shelved it and did not include it on Hard Promises. Its very possible it could have been on the next Petty release. Its the way Jimmy went about it that rubbed Tom the wrong way. Give me the song, record it for Stevie...great thanks. Jealous some? Maybe. But Jimmy would not have regrets if it was pure jealousy. There was enormous pressure on Jimmy to make sure Bella Donna was a success. So I think Tom felt his good song was taken from him for the wrong reason. Its all water under the bridge now but back in 1981 when Bella Donna eclipsed Hard Promises and Tom's album was not as successful as his prior one, his song lands in the top 3 for Stevie Nicks, I can feel the sting. These albums were charting at the exact same time. I think Tom felt betrayed. If your own producer thought it was such a hit song, why did he not persist it go on your own album?

Here is the interview. Iovine interview starts at approx. 1:50:00 and Stevie starts at 2:29:00
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-8pKyc8IDvI

Well, it was about 36 years and a lot of drugs ago. I doubt Tom Petty feels that way now. Stevie and Tom are good friends- I think I read she was going to do a show together (Australia, maybe?) in the near future.

Joe.... but still she hung on, no matter how sh&ttily he treated her.

Some of her married boyfriends...?

I'm pretty sure she dumped him. The whole "you walk out that door you cease to exist" thing. But he just never really cared either way lol and probably set the whole thing up for failure anyways.

Mick dropped her for Sara if that counts.

You are making Stevie to be an innocent angel. Stevie was a newly married woman who went on the road and instantly began shacking up with her opening act.

You are absolutely right- none of these band people are innocent angels, not even Joe. They were all using drugs/alcohol and making a lot of decisions that many here might not have made.

"Joe was married five times: He was married briefly to Margie Walsh in the 1960s, to Stefany Rhodes from 1971 to 1978, to Juanita Boyer from 1980 to 1988 and to Denise Driscoll from 1999 to 2006. Walsh married Marjorie Bach (sister of Barbara Bach and sister-in-law of Ringo Starr) in Los Angeles on December 13, 2008."

And from Joe Walsh, there's the association of the song "Has Anyone Ever Written Anything For You."

"Walsh's eldest daughter, Emma Kristen, was born in 1971 and died in 1974 at 3 years of age as a result of injuries suffered in an automobile accident on her way to nursery school. Her story inspired the track "Song For Emma" on Walsh's first "official" solo album So What released later that year. In her memory, he had a fountain and memorial plaque placed in a park in which she played: North Boulder Park in Boulder, Colorado, He has said that the album name ("So What") was a result of Emma's death—that nothing else seemed meaningful or important in the months that followed. The strain eventually contributed to Walsh's divorce from his second wife Stefany."

yeah, that was pretty much just a technicality. He had been out of the relationship except for the occasional hookup for a very long time by then. Check old interviews where she talks about planning to see him, "kicking everyone out" of her house so she and he could be alone after months and months of not seeing each other ..... and he just wouldn't show up. No call, no nothing. So yeah, her saying "we're done" is a bit of a joke, a way for her to save face. it's like the "you're fired" "you can't fire me, I QUIT!" so you can tell your friends you didn't get fired.

she was also a woman who, before she went on the road, told her husband that she wanted a divorce.

her 'sin' if you want to call it that (I don't mean in a religious sense, just in the sense of the thing people get judgy about) wasn't "cheating" on her spouse, it was marrying him in the first place. She has said in several interviews, notably the Oprah Master Class, that she just "wanted to get my hands on that baby". She didn't really want Kim. I've thought for a long time, since before she admitted it, that she really just wanted the baby. I suspect (she has not said this part) that she saw this as a way for her to have a baby without having the baby herself. Like Robin was the magical baby carrier FOR her to have a child. Drugs and delusion can make you think things like that.

I have an old ET interview done while they were rehearsing for the WH tour and it's about the end of her marriage. So she set the bar before the tour.

I don't think her marrying Kim out of crazy, druggy grief then wanting a divorce and moving on is the thing to judge her for. I think the things to judge her for are things like her hooking up with Hernan Rojas even though she and everyone knew he was engaged, leading him to break up with his fiancee and then her breaking up with him, she caused a big disaster there. And hooking up with Jim Recor even though he was married to Sara and then acting like a big old hypocrite about Sara and Mick getting together. Hooking up with multiple married men. Cheating on multiple partners. That stuff has always and probably will always be the thing that I judge Stevie for over anything else. It's gross and the fact that she never really expressed any regret for the other people involved makes it even worse.

There is a sense of entitlement when people get super famous, the rules don't apply to them (they think)-- and frankly the people around them tend to support that view. They live far from reality as the rest of us know it and get away with sh&t people wouldn't tolerate from any "regular" person. I love Stevie as an artist but she's totally bought into this view, even though she would swear she hasn't. :shrug:

Okay there's some tea I never knew. But should she be judged more harshly than say the men in the band? Should she be judged at all?

^ I agree. It makes it sound as if these men are victims of some sort of mysterious force. I do believe these people were all under the influence of medications- "non-prescription." And there always seems to be a sense of "blaming the woman." I don't understand that at all.

These Oprah videos are interesting:

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I didn't know about the Rojas thing either till I read where Ken Caillait talked about it. The Sara thing was in CAH's book. I'm not saying no one else slept around and did bad things, like who even knows what Mick did lol, but the thing is is that she did do all these bad things, multiple times. And acted like a hypocrite. And only ever made things about herself, never really acted sorry about it for the other people involved or the fact that it's just wrong. I think you should be judged for that. It's not a good sign for the strength of your morals and respect for others when you do things like that. Men who cheat are guilty but the "other woman" is just as bad if you ask me, for knowingly getting involved. And Stevie was both a cheater AND "the other woman" more than once.

**EDIT: I believe the Rojas tidbit might actually have been from CAH book as well! Either that or something from Ken. I remember it was known they had had a relationship but I was shocked when I read the dirty details.

Let's face it, she was total slut. Don't blame it on her. Blame it on her Wild Heart!

There's plenty of blame to go around! Stevie should have kept her hands off guys who were "taken", but all those men were only too happy to drop their girlfriends/wives like hot potatoes to get a piece of Stevie Nicks.

A woman who knowingly gets involved with someone that has a partner ought to be horribly ashamed of herself because that's a terrible thing to do. Stevie wasn't 12 years old, she was 30, you can't use "she shouldn't have done that" logic on her actions because at age 30 you know that's wrong. The 'other woman' is just as guilty as the man with the wife/girlfriend. It doesn't matter if she's "Stevie Nicks" and everyone wants a "piece" of her.

She is "woman with wide canyon."

I'm not trying to slut shame here, Stevie could've slept with the entire single male population of California in the 70s and 80s and that wouldn't be wrong. What I think is her bad quality is that she did it in an immoral way, going after other people's husbands or boyfriends, cheating on her own partners.

Yeah, how about that Christine McVie, married to John but sleeping with the lighting guy and even writing a song about how much she enjoyed having sex with him, and then performing that same song live with John? Or Mick sleeping with Stevie while married, as well as many other women? And look at how many times Mick has been married. Fidelity appears to have been a challenge for Mick no matter who he was married to. But I still love their music!

My point is, yes it's nasty when Stevie or anyone has an affair with someone who's married, but that doesn't make her a home wrecker. The person who made those wedding vows, they're the one who screwed up their marriage. Was the lighting guy Christine was having an affair with the reason she divorced John? No. Now, I don't know anything about this Rojas guy, nor do I care, but I would bet big bucks if he cheated on his wife or fiancee with Stevie, she wasn't the only one he cheated with.

A quick aside- a friend once told me about her college friend, a man who whose wife cheated on him several times, but because he loved her so much, he took her back every time. This resulted in several reconciliations, breakups, and a bankruptcy because he would follow her to every city she moved to and bail her out of financial problems. She ended the story by saying "I don't know what's wrong with her," and I said "her? What's wrong with him?" I guess this shows how people can have a different perception of things.

I'm going to have to dig those books out again! I either missed or completely forgot these tidbits! :lol:

Slut shaming. Disgusting. Give us a full rundown of where your pecker's been and then we'll talk.

+1000 :nod:

Right? What we haven't touched on is the period in time that this was all happening. The 70's and early 80's were a time when people were pushing the boundaries of societal norms. The whole free love thing from the sixties carried over. People were very, very promiscuous. That all came to a halt when the HIV epidemic exploded in the mid 80's. The party was over so to speak.

It's always struck me as odd that Iovine didn't hear a single on Bella Donna, when in fact the album produced 3 big singles beyond SDMHA.

EO17 would've been a strong first single. Maybe a little too strong/hard? Maybe the issue was he didn't hear a good introductory single, one that was pop enough for FM fans but hard enough for rock fans...?

I think it would've been a bit too much for EO17 to be lead single. Too harsh. SDMHA was a good choice.

If it was from Ken it was probably an interview or a Q&A or something, I remember his book didn't cover much aside from Rumours. It was most likely CAH, she spilled a lot of the relationship tea. I remember she even mentioned that Sharon Celani was hooking up with Ray Lindsay :lol:

Yes I think that was strange too. Leather and Lace jumps out as a very radio friendly single. But I think they were marketing Stevie as a full rock goddess and did not want another adult contemporary Sara or Dreams. Edge of 17 is amazing but maybe they thought too long as a single or something.

Christine was not seeing Curry Grant (lighting director) while she and John were still married. They were divorced BEFORE the band even started recording Rumours. A lot of tv/magazine/newspaper reporters like to say she was having an affair with the lighting director while married because they are lazy and don't do their homework.

The tidbit about Hernan Rojas was from CAH's book after all! I found the part where she mentions it. She's talking about Jimmy Iovine in the paragraph and then mentions the old romance. Here's the screenshot.