Rolling Stone Magazine Album Reviews

[foxyluva]

I can't believe how much this magazine dogs on Stevie, its ridiculous. I mean, they somewhat have some points, but they completely don't like anything about her music style at all. I mean, they gave WH 2 stars out of 5 for goodness sake - same as SA

Read their reviews of her albums here:

http://www.rollingstone.com/artists/stevienicks/reviews

[JazmenFlowers]

Originally Posted by foxyluva

I can't believe how much this magazine dogs on Stevie, its ridiculous. I mean, they somewhat have some points, but they completely don't like anything about her music style at all. I mean, they gave WH 2 stars out of 5 for goodness sake - same as SA

Read their reviews of her albums here:

http://www.rollingstone.com/artists/stevienicks/reviews

I've learned not to really care. I think a lot of it is, as Stevie admits, her airy fairy princess image. They don't take her seriously. That's a shame because she is a great songwriter and performer with a distinct style that can't ever be duplicated.

I love Barbra Streisand's character's response to reviews in A Star Is Born: "I don't know 'cause I never read 'em"

[DavidMn]

Originally Posted by JazmenFlowers

I've learned not to really care. I think a lot of it is, as Stevie admits, her airy fairy princess image. They don't take her seriously. That's a shame because she is a great songwriter and performer with a distinct style that can't ever be duplicated.

I love Barbra Streisand's character's response to reviews in A Star Is Born: "I don't know 'cause I never read 'em"

Exactly! I know what I like and what makes me happy, and I absolutely couldnt give a **** less if anyone else likes the same stuff I do or not.

[SpyNote]

I wouldn't say Stevie has the most impressive catalog of solo albums. She's been inconsistent vocally and lyrically since Wild Heart. But RS's main objections are pretty absurd. They usually give up on her albums when song meanings aren't totally spelled out. So, of course, with Stevie, you're not going to get the whole story. They really slammed Wild Heart and Mirror for this reason. I think the only album that they were complimentary towards throughout was TISL.

[DavidMn]

Originally Posted by SpyNote

I wouldn't say Stevie has the most impressive catalog of solo albums. She's been inconsistent vocally and lyrically since Wild Heart. But RS's main objections are pretty absurd. They usually give up on her albums when song meanings aren't totally spelled out. So, of course, with Stevie, you're not going to get the whole story. They really slammed Wild Heart and Mirror for this reason. I think the only album that they were complimentary towards throughout was TISL.

Well, you certainly know what youre talking about with how big a fan you are.

[amber]

It's weird that they said Some Become Strangers and Imperial Hotel are the high points of RAL. I would've thought they would've bagged Imperial Hotel so hard.
That particular review seemed to like things more organic with Stevie, not so much synth.

I like this phrase, though: "Stevie's distinctive growl can attach a hook to some pretty slippery sentiments." which I totally agree with.


"In "Stand Back," she sings, "No one knows/How I feel/What I say/Unless you read between my lines." Well, whose fault is that?"

[SapphireSister]

"How can anyone so hip be so incredibly silly" Yep, that pretty much sums it up. They were tough on her but it takes a certain person to get Stevie Nicks and you guys know it. I've never expected critics to be fans of Stevie because I know it takes a certain "type" of person to understand where she is coming from.

I could give two ****s what the critics had to say although I did find a lot of it quite interesting and thought provoking regardless of whether of not I agreed with it. The one thing and the ONLY thing that matters to me about Stevie is that her music touches me in a way that no other person, place, or thing in this universe does and that's all it comes down to. There is no rhyme or reason or explanation for it, it just is! (wow, I'm sounding kind of airy fairy there myself, ehem). I welcome any criticisms/altering points of view because it will never change how her music has impacted my life and I like to hear other people's perspectives who don't seem to get it. In real life I'm quite analytical and logical so it seems a bit ironic that I am a fan of Stevie's music since so much of what she sings about makes little or no sense but that's part of my love affair with her and I think the same can be said for a lot of her fans. We're not all gypsies and street angels sitting in rooms with some lace and paper flowers on the Edge of Seventeen (but maybe somewhere out in the back of our minds we wish we were?).

Imperial Hotel the highlight of Rock a Little? Bwahahahahah

"Step-mother to an infant daughter"? At least get your facts straight.

"Stevie Nicks may have prefigured Madonna's and Prince's lace fetishes but the tart frankness of today's Top Ten market makes her seem a bit of a prude".

Hey I never thought about that the lace thing, so true! Madonna and Prince need to give her some props, for real. Oh and about being prude, I guess they missed her snorting lines in between takes of the I Can't Wait Video .

[David]

Originally Posted by SapphireSister

"How can anyone so hip be so incredibly silly" Yep, that pretty much sums it up. They were tough on her but it takes a certain person to get Stevie Nicks and you guys know it. I've never expected critics to be fans of Stevie because I know it takes a certain "type" of person to understand where she is coming from.

Stevie makes me feel both moist & dry.

She's really good.

Why don't you like Imperial Hotel? That's the song that really details her tailspin.

[SapphireSister]

Originally Posted by David

Stevie makes me feel both moist & dry.

Too much information but thanks for the visual!

She's really good.

And when she's good, she's very very good.

Why don't you like Imperial Hotel? That's the song that really details her tailspin.

It used to be my very least favorite song on RAL and the only one I did not like but I gave it another chance a few months back and discovered it's not as bad as I'd previously thought. The main thing I never liked about it was the music, simple as that. I normally don't like songs with that organ sound (there are exceptions however such as SDMHA) and it's very prominent in that song. Do you know the sound I'm talking about? It's an organ right? I tend not to like songs that have that which is odd because I love the synthesizer sound and they are both keyboard instruments.

I like it now alright, it has a very catchy beat but it doesn't touch me emotionally. If anything it's a fun, upbeat song but not very deep musically and not by any means the best song on the album IMO.

Tell me why you like it so much and how it "details her tailspin". I love new perspectives and I'm going to listen to it on the way home from work tonight in your honor.

[Jyqm]

I thought this article about the importance and purpose of criticism would make a good addition to this thread. David, I think you'll enjoy reading this:

http://www.popmatters.com/columns/jenkins/060420.shtml

[Johnny Stew]

Originally Posted by Jyqm

I thought this article about the importance and purpose of criticism would make a good addition to this thread.

Interesting article, Jyqm. Thanks for posting it.

I'd like to comment on this specific paragraph:

Perhaps the best criticism... surmounts its lowly parasitic status in order to become a (nearly) self-standing work of art in its own right. Far from seeing this as an exception to the rule, we should see it as the template for criticism proper (public and personal).

One of the biggest issues I have with rock critics, is that I've seen far too few genuinely thoughtful critics (I always cite our own David O. as the type of critic I respect), and far too many of the smug, "look how witty I am" variety.

One example that instantly comes to mind, is the one sentence review of 'Rock A Little' in Musician magazine, which basically said, "Yeah, rocks very little." That's that. End of story.
I'm sure anyone who dislikes Stevie, or enjoys pithy reviews, would get a kick out of it... but it told me absolutely nothing about the album. All it told me was that the critic was self-important and thought himself to be funny.

The same is true of the Entertainment Weekly review of 'Time,' which I have referenced on here before ("who gives a Tusk about a Fleetwood Mac album without Stevie Nicks").
Sure, it may have summed up a lot of people's feelings about that album... and I can chuckle at it (though I certainly don't agree with it)... but it told me absolutely nothing about the music contained therein.

I'm going to share one of my favorite reviews of a Stevie album. The critic's name is Robert Sheffield, but unfortunately I can't remember which magazine it was published in (hopefully someone else will recognize it). I was around 16 at the time, and back then I used to cut reviews and articles from various magazines in order to put them in a scrapbook... failing in many cases to note the publication. *slaps forehead*

Stevie Nicks
The Other Side Of The Mirror
Modern/Atlantic

The new solo LP from Fleetwood Mac siren Stevie Nicks is called The Other Side Of The Mirror, like in her "Gypsy" video a few years back. Remember, she was swishing her skirts, dancing in the mirror, and then out in the rain and then leading all these white-clad vestals through the forests of Beulah . . . videos were cool then. Yeah, maybe that mirror, and all those lyrics about white-winged doves and Welsh witches drowning in the sea of love were a bit much. But hey, Stevie's vision of adolescent desire was as vibrant and real as Billy Squier's, wasn't it? She wasn't all boring and "rock" minded. I was down with Stevie.
So this new album brings her back to the mirror--except the Other Side. Most of these songs take place in the wreckage of Stevie's old mythology. Like "Rooms On Fire," in which she tells her elfin love-twerp that she's actually known his "magic" much longer than she's known him, or "Alice," where the gypsies kick her out (presumably for not owning any pants). Then there's the beatific ballad "Ooh My Love." Stevie's sitting at the loom with her white-winged crone-muse behind "castle walls" of adolescent girl-fantasy. She's growing up, and the walls are crumbling down. And she isn't sure whether to mourn or not, because there's this guy standing outside waiting for her. Stevie spends the album in the rubble of her castle, making us guess about her reaction. She keeps her visions to herself.
What she gives to us is the music, and the buzz of her unique throat. There's nothing folkish about her tunes anymore--they churn on uplifting synth tracks like her 1983 hit "If Any Falls [sic]." She builds tension by pitting aggressively strummed one-chord riffs against each other, the way John Waite's "Missing You" or the original Velvet's "Femme Fatale" did.
On some tunes Stevie comes off as stiff, but for most of Mirror her vocals get by on their terse emotion. As her timbre gets drier, her phrasing gets only more precise--on "Alice" and "Juliet" she shifts between song and speech and hits just the note of personal fragmentation the melodies are aching to reach. Her consistently soulful brogue, while not as nimble as it used to be, earns the mythic status she's always demanded. Stevie slurs like Mrs. Butterworth or trills like the Vermont Maid, but it's always sticky stuff.

--Robert Sheffield