Stevie's Last Solo-Written Song
 

Got curious about this today - the song for which Stevie most recently wrote both music and lyrics. I think it would be "Soldier's Angel" in 2011, correct? ("Moonlight" from the same year could also kinda count I guess, but of course at least half of that song was written decades earlier.)

I checked copyright registrations and it doesn't seem she's registered anything solo-written since then either.

I wonder if "Solider's Angel" will prove to be the last song she writes on her own. There could be worse notes to end on, I guess!

Copyrights not withstanding, IDK if she's ever actually completely written a song by herself. She's always needed a Lindsey, a Jimmy, a somebody to turn her little ditty poetry into something of substance.

I lost my liner notes for the 24 Karat Gold Deluxe cd but did she write I Don't Care solo?

Or was that Campbell?

What's striking about Soldier's Angel is that she made a point of stating that had it not been for Lindsey agreeing to come to her house to play SA for her, the song wouldn't have been on IYD.

Thus to me, the song as I hear it on IYD, can't genuinely be considered a solely Stevie tune. I think she even said before the 2013 tour that it was the most BN song they ever recorded.

Bingo. Music by Mike.

The misogyny on this board is unbearable these days. :rolleyes:

Stevie wrote Soldier’s Angel. Lindsey was the one who was able to capture on guitar what Stevie herself did in her piano demo. I am not discounting Lindsey’s contributions as a producer to Stevie’s music but come on - if you look at most of her demos, you find the bones of what would become some of her greatest hits, even with her own rudimentary piano skills. And trying to take her lyrics away from her by referring to them as “ditties” is just offensive. Lindsey is a great guitar player and producer but Stevie is the superior lyricist by far. Their skills complement rather than diminish each other.

Also, I checked the credits and Stevie is credited as the sole I Don’t Care writer, as she is on most of 24KG. I think she said she improvised the last verse in the studio so this is probably her most recent solo-written song.

"We recorded it live and did some harmonies, and then he did some little lead guitar things and it was perfect," Nicks says. "There's no other players, just me and him. Not only did we create something that's probably as Buckingham Nicks as we have been since 1973, but... I think that song really brought Lindsey and I back together. He said to me as he was leaving on that second day, 'I feel like we're closer than we've been in 30 years.' It certainly opens a lot of doors." From here: http://www.fleetwoodmac.net/fwm/inde...948&Itemid=195

Above - Stevie herself suggesting Soldier's Angel is a Buckingham Nicks creation. I'm sharing her view.

I don't see the misogyny point. You do not know what's in my head or my heart. I love Stevie. Seen her over 40 times, even bought her new 3 disc set.

This is a forum which is an exchange of opinions. There was no hate speech shared by me.

Not nice of you. Thankfully, many believe we all answer to The Lord for how we speak to others :thumbsup:

I think a few people believe that you're not allowed to dislike Stevie without being a misogynist.

What I don’t get....(misogyny apart)..

Some of her demos, early demos I mean, sound pretty good.
Just her and the piano BUT the tune is there.
Before anyone else has given the song a hand.
Before production.

Some of them sound really good, some better than the finished article.
So she can and did write songs.

Agreed. I mean 24 KARAT GOLD is essentially fleshing out (slightly) the existing demos. Nicks has written some *great* songs and in many cases Buckingham's production did add to how well they turned out, and she's said so in interviews before. A few times, "Welcome to the Room, Sara" comes to mind, Buckingham's production actually was worse than the demo.

I agree 100%. There's always been a vibe of misogynistic hostility regarding Nicks on this board, but it got way worse with Buckingham's firing.

So if someone doesn't like a man....say, Donald Trump(or Lindsey, or any man), that means that they're misandrous?

Yes it is, actually for quite some time. As is the endless ruining of threads by haters. I come here once in a while wanting to engage in a thread or two in the Stevie forum and find that it’s been hijacked by people (person, really) who for whatever reason spend their time posting on threads about people they hate.

This is not the first time that it’s been said Stevie needed a man to turn her songs into anything.

If I as a 50 year old man can see the endless misogyny, others can too. They are just choosing not to.

As for the thread topic, I hope that I Don’t Care isn’t her final solo song as I can barely tolerate it. Would be much better if Soldier’s Angel.

No it doesn’t. But you already knew that.

Yeah, I don't even bother to engage with that one. Blocked and moved on.

Not liking Stevie doesn't necessarily equate with being a misogynist. The lack of logic being used here is staggering...

I can't recall anyone saying she needed a MAN.

The harsh reality is she needs SOMEONE who is a far better musician than she is to turn her songs from nice demos to actual songs that would get played on the radio (she herself says this). Sheryl Crow was one of those people.

The reality is, Stevie herself is prejudiced against other women. SHe's said many many times (not that long ago again) that she doesn't like listening to the advice or inputs of other women in her career or her songs. Christine and Sheryl seem to be notable exceptions. She likes working with men and being the main girl so the reality is, by her choice most of her collaborators and cowriters have all been men.

I don't think most people on here think she HAS to work with a MAN to get her songs out, but that for the most part is has BEEN men who have turned her raw material into radio playable hits. Her choice.

And when the hell did having a different opinion become "hating"?? I own everything this woman has ever recorded (often multiple copies) and have gone to see her live for decades. I love her stuff but am also able to see her flaws. Most of her demos, especially as the years went on, are very monotonic and are, as she herself described them, her plonking with two fingers on the keyboard. Yes she writes the top end-- the melody and lyrics-- but she doesn't give musicians much to work with. By Chris's own description Lindsey had to figure out what Christine should play on Stevie's songs because Chris couldn't make heads or tails of them, and by Benmont's own account Jimmy had Benmont sit with her and do the same-- figure out what the musicians could play from her solo demos. Fact, like it or not. Could it have been done by a woman? Technically yes, but Stevie wouldn't have allowed it.

I also looked at liner notes for 24 Karat Gold for the regular cd, not deluxe: Lyrics were by Stevie Nicks, Music was by Waddy and Michael Campbell

I was just researching whether “Show Them The Way,” released not long after I started this thread, qualified as a solo written song. It does not, as it was co-written by keyboardist Greg Kurstin. He perhaps most famously co-wrote “Hello” with Adele.

So “Soldier’s Angel” still holds the title!

Most of the lyrics for Show Them The Way were written in 2008..horrible song BTW.

What would he have written? The piano music was written by her I thought.

clearly not.

He may have contributed to some components of the song while she still laid the groundwork for it. I know that on Bella Donna the music to "Kind of Woman" was mostly her but Benmont Tench has a credit on the song because he wrote the bridge or something. There is something similar with "Think About It" and Roy Bittan. I still consider those songs to be solo-written compositions, just with a little help fleshing it out for the album.

I see. Thank you.
It's like Gaga's process. She composes the structure and she gets some people to flesh out some parts.

I think I remember Stevie saying now that she wrote the Him and Her part of Show Them The Way over a bridge Greg made up.

Like with “Annabel Lee” — doesn’t Waddy have a co-write credit? He probably wrote that little instrumental bridge-slash-turnaround. Stevie doesn’t write bridges-slash-turnarounds. But a track needs a little of that variety for a change of environment.

For “Think About It,” I bet Roy wrote the music for the section that starts “And the heart says danger/And the heart says whatever.” It jumps into a minor key that Stevie wouldn’t have proposed on her own. Her musical mind doesn’t think that way; she gives all her musical attention to the vocal lines, not to the block construction as it modulates around.

Roy has a writing credit on How Still My Love.

These collaborators do more than write a few little notes here and there. She's said that Roy turned How Still My Love into the song it is. He rearranged the parts.

I find it amusing how so many people want to downplay the role of the very talented musicians who collaborated with her. She's just not a capable musician and has been bailed out many times with a sort of veil over the fact that they did so. There was a strong PR machinery on her team to promote Stevie as this sole, capable songwriter. Sorry, but honestly none of her songs would have been as successful without that kind of help. And that's not shameful. Indeed, the decreasing success of her later albums I think in large part is due to her ego wanting her albums to sound more and more like her demos. (Cue all the defenders of her demos. I love her demos too, but they would NOT get radio play and big sales. Sorry)

Hmmm... my album liner notes give sole writing credit on "How Still" too S. Nicks. The only songs that are billed as co-writes on that album are "Kind of Woman" and "Think About It," and of course "Stop Draggin'" is Campbell/Petty.

It's an interesting question, what qualifies as co-writing and what qualifies as a producer or musician just doing what they ordinarily do to contribute to a song. To me, re-arranging sections and instrumental arrangements would fall into the latter category, and I think that's primarily what Stevie's early stuff got. As she got deeper into her solo career, she relied more on others to write actual melodies and lyrics for her.