Tahoe Reviews

[michelej1]

[This is largely made up of quotes from the Star interview, but it's a bit different.]

By Dana Turvey

http://www.tahoe.com/article/2010080...0809998/0/HOME

Stevie Nicks has grown up. After years in the spotlight with Fleetwood Mac and her own robust solo career, the blonde, throaty chanteuse has finally buried some demons and a couple of hatchets.

Nicks’ focus is fully vested in her amazing songwriting. She has been working with ex-Eurythmics guitarist-producer Dave Stewart on an album that is “mostly finished.”
“There is an Italian love song I wrote when I was in Italy last summer,” the singer told the Ventura County Star in late July. “There are two tracks that Michael Campbell (from Tom Petty’s Heartbreakers) wrote that I wrote songs on top of, and they are just magical. There are love songs, hard rock ‘n’ roll songs, really contemplative songs and very Bob ‘Dylan-y’ songs and there are lots of good poems.

“We have a song I wrote when I was 17 that is the words to an Edgar Allan Poe poem called “Annabel Lee.” It’s just lived in my head since I was 17. I didn’t record it about until 10 years ago. We found the demo and I’m not sure why I didn’t put it in (the 2001 album,) “Trouble in Shangri-la,” but I guess things got misplaced,” Nicks surmised.

From her early days bouncing around with her family to homes in Phoenix, Salt Lake City, Los Angeles and San Francisco, Nicks had written a vast bit of material while still in her teens. Then she met guitarist Lindsey Buckingham and started what would become the focal relationship of her life; well, maybe, so far. When Buckingham was offered a steady gig with Fleetwood Mac, he famously insisted on bringing Stevie along, saying they were a “package deal.”

Fleetwood Mac — post Lindsey and Stevie — became something for the history books. While the London-formed band with guitarist Peter Green had put out 14 lukewarm albums prior, the addition of the couple led to mega-recordings that included “Rumours,” the 1977 album that has sold more than 40 million copies to date. While still cranking out hits with Mac, plus a heavy tour schedule, Stevie Nicks showed her chops in 1981 with her first solo project. “Bella Donna” went to No. 1 and she has done well with five more solo efforts.

While most recognized for her husky contralto, diaphanous shawls, honeyed locks and platform heels, Nicks’ songwriting skills aren’t to be glossed over. For Fleetwood Mac, she has written still-popular hits like “Rhiannon,” “Landslide,” “Dreams” and “Gold Dust Woman.”

Her solo projects have included “Stand Back,” “Leather and Lace” and her famous duet with pal Tom Petty, “Stop Dragging My Heart Around.” Altogether Nicks, with and without Fleetwood Mac, has been nominated for seven Grammys, while “Rumours” took the award for Album of the Year when it came out.

Mixed in with all this fame was the requisite overindulgence of the day. The blend of superstardom, wealth and, let’s just say, several interpersonal problems among the band, led to Nicks’ addictions to alcohol and drugs. In the 1980s and ’90s, there was a flurry of emotional stress, as Nicks and Buckingham notoriously split up after six years together, and the band went often from disbanded to reunited. Clean since 1994, Nicks told an Australian publication, “The Age,” about the change:

“My life is calmer now because I’m not on drugs, but it’s also wonderful and exciting because I’m not on drugs. A lot of the time during those last four or five years before I went into rehab, I really didn’t think I was going to make it out alive. So I’m thrilled every day that I did,” Nicks said.

Of course, in the day, it was hard not to come across music and drug abuse. Early on, after watching both Janis Joplin and Jimi Hendrix perform live, Nicks walked away with inspiration for her own blossoming career.

In her recent V.C. Star interview, Nicks recalled, “Another show that really knocked me out was Jimi Hendrix at San Jose State. He was awesome. He was extremely humble and extremely nice to the audience. (Janis) had a little bit of that arrogant thing, but that was OK because she was so great. You can be arrogant if you can back it up.

“Jimi just blew my mind. I came away from those two shows going, ‘Well, I have to remember to always be humble because I preferred his humbleness.’ I thought that’s going to be me on stage. I will be very humble on stage always. Sometimes I will talk too much and sometimes I will be too gabby, but I will go that route and I will try not to be arrogant. It’s easy to be arrogant because all of a sudden you were rich and a year and a half ago you were a waitress.”

Ridiculously hot still at age 62, Stevie Nicks has listened well to her early advice. Her public persona — despite the oft Buckingham bickering, has always been personable with her fans. She and Fleetwood Mac (Christine McVie has retired) continue to tour and put out albums, and in recent years Nicks and Buckingham have become comfortable again onstage.

“Now we are good. We are actually friends,” she once told VH1. “He has two children, a little girl and a little boy. Needless to say, going from a selfish rock ‘n’ roll god to having two babies, it’s very much changed his life. He can’t be selfish anymore. And he is thrilled with these little kids; they are precious. He is a much softer, sweeter man and I love that, because I knew that softer man a long time ago. So I’m seeing my old friend back again.”

Ah, there’s the Stevie Nicks we connect with — the poetess-enchantress who waded through turmoil, but has matured because of just that. Now, she’s on a quick five-show run of live performances, which includes a stop at the Harvey’s Outdoor Concert series Friday, Aug. 6.

According to the Santa Barbara Independent, Nicks plans to do many of her hits “and then you throw a couple of new things in that you don’t want to tell anybody about because it’s fun. We’re going to try to do three songs that we don’t usually do, two of which are not my songs, and one that I haven’t done in a long time.”

“I just did 83 shows for Fleetwood Mac. Our last show was on the 21st of December, so it’s like I just got off the road. For me, this is a breeze. I am really excited about it. We only have three days of rehearsal and we haven’t played in almost two years, but my band is so great that we kind of don’t have to. This is not a tour, but just a few shows. I don’t know what they are going to call it — the “This Is Not a Tour” Tour?”