Stevie's most criminal songs

[Thrown_Down]

Originally Posted by tabruns

I agree with you in that Stevie had a period of years where the quality of her material slipped, but I wouldn't pick "Silver Girl" or especially "Sweet Girl" (which I consider to be a strong song) as evidence of same.

For me Nicks' career has been something like this:

1. Classic Nicks (includes the albums Fleetwood Mac, Rumours, Tusk and Bella Donna) - the fact that Nicks could only get her best songs on the first 3 Mac albums helped establish her reputation as a talented songwriter. For her first solo album she was able to cull from a big backlog of songs, so she came up with a very strong set.

2. Cocaine Nicks (Mirage, Wild Heart and Rock A Little) - For these albums Nicks still has moments of brilliance but you can see the effect that massive cocaine use is having on her music. She's getting somewhat sloppy, and some of the songs lack the focus of the earlier material. Each consecutive album shows more of the impact of coke.

3. Klonopin Nicks (Tango In The Night, The Other Side Of The Mirror, Behind The Mask, Street Angel). While coke made Nicks erratic and wild, klonopin dulled her senses and her songwriting ability. Again, each consecutive album shows more of the effect - by the time of Street Angel, Nicks was reduced to recording songs that had been left-overs from previous recording sessions. Her songs during this period became more and more pedestrian, lacking that magic spark that they used to have. She also began to rely more on outside writers for the music than previously.

4. Recovery Nicks ("Paper Doll", "Twisted", The Dance, Trouble In Shangri-La, Say You Will, In Your Dreams). IMO what we see here are momentary returns to form ("Paper Doll", "Twisted" and "Sweet Girl") that became more and more consistent as time went on. TISL was Nicks' most focused album since Bella Donna. Had Say You Will been a regular Mac album - i.e. with 3 Nicks songs on it - she probably would have turned in "Say You Will", "Thrown Down" and I think "Illume" (even though many people on here don't like it....she, Lindsey and Mick all do). In Your Dreams is a great album, probably her first to really reach "classic Mac" levels.

I'd agree with all that, but I would be more inclined to put Wild Heart in the classic section.