Monday, November 02, 2020

REVIEW Stevie Nicks 24 Karat Gold the Concert


‘Stevie Nicks 24 Karat Gold the Concert’ is too long, but worth a cozy sit-down

BY SKYLAR DE PAUL
The Daily Californian
Grade: 3.5/5.0
November 2, 2020

Stevie Nicks is inarguably one of the most celebrated figures in rock history. She’s a championed songwriter, a two-time inductee at the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame and now, thanks to the powers of director and producer Joe Thomas and Nicks herself, she could be “performing” from the comforts of your own living room. 

In a new concert movie, filmed over two nights in Pittsburgh and Indianapolis during her 2017 tour, “Stevie Nicks 24 Karat Gold the Concert” premiered at drive-ins, select theaters and other spaces for two nights last month. The film is a breath of fresh air for those craving a live listen, but boy, does this movie deliver much more than songs — it’s equal parts wonderful and absolutely tiring. 

In the opening scene, Nicks enters the stage with the same graceful bow she’s performed for decades on end, wearing her signature all-black gown, boots and fingerless gloves — truly no one can pull off the part-time witch look like the “Rhiannon” songstress herself. The scarves tied around her microphone stand and tambourine speak to her timeless aesthetic, viewers finding familiar comfort in her shiny, gold crescent moon necklace.

With a performance of “Gold and Braid,” a late ’70s groove sets the tone for a night of mystic tunes. For the movie’s set list, cutting the two performance nights together, Nicks says she went through her “dark gothic trunk of lost songs” to curate the performance, playing everything she never had the chance to or that she never released on a record.

“This show is different,” she says. “It’s not the same Stevie Nicks show you’ve seen a million times, because I am not the same Stevie Nicks that you’ve seen a million times.”

It’s clear by her stage presence that Nicks hasn’t forgotten how to work a crowd, even if this was filmed a few years back. “If Anyone Falls” shows excellent supporting harmonies by backup singers, the band working in a synergy that only musicians of a certain stature and experience can ever truly reach. Synth keyboards add depth to the live sound of the concert, supporting Nicks’ ever-controlled vocal delivery.

The only glaring downside of this film is its exhaustive run time. Clocking in at over two hours of songs and prolonged monologues, Nicks spends much of the time ruminating on the various situations that inspired her career and certain songs. It reaches the point where some viewers probably can’t help but wonder if even the live audience was starting to get tired of her rambling, but nevertheless, Nicks is still shown to be a gentle entertainer by nature.

Sunday, November 01, 2020

Fleetwood Mac Albums / Singles Chart Updates


This week on the charts, after peaking last week in the US at #12 Dreams slides to #21 and the album Rumours slides down to #14 from #7 the previous week. 

In Canada Rumours remains in the Top 10 down two places to #7. Dreams is still in the Top 20 down to #18 from #9 last week. 

In the UK, Dreams also drops on the singles chart to #40 after peaking at #35. Rumours remains at #20 and 50 Years - Don't Stop drops out of the Top 10 down to 15.  

In Ireleand, Dreams peaked at #24 and moves down four places to #28 this week. Rumours and 50 Years - Don't Stop remain in the Top 10 on the albums charts, both are down slightly from last week.

In Australia Dreams is still in the Top 10 at #7 this week, down two places from #5 last week.  Rumours drops to #12 from #9 last week. In New Zealand, Rumours is still a Top 10 album moving up to #6 from #7 last week.

(Everything in brackets denotes last week)


Tuesday, October 27, 2020

BOX OFFICE STATS: Stevie Nicks 24 Karat Gold The Concert Film

‘Stevie Nicks 24 Karat Gold’ Doc Heads To PVOD As Distributor Trafalgar Releasing Adapts To Pandemic Era

By Tom Grater - Deadline
October 26, 2020

Following its global cinema release last week, event music doc Stevie Nicks 24 Karat Gold The Concert is heading to premium VOD as distributor Trafalgar Releasing looks to employ new release strategies in the pandemic era.

The film will be available to rent online from October 29 at 9am PT at a premium $19.99 price point until November 5 at 11.59 PT via the official website. Audiences will have 48 hours to watch after purchase. The move follows similar PVOD endeavors undertaken by studios during the pandemic such as Universal with Trolls World Tour.

This marks the first such VOD release for event cinema specialist Trafalgar, which has to date relied heavily on theatrical in its business model. The company reduced its output while cinemas were disrupted by the pandemic and is now looking to take its ‘event’ style of releasing into the digital sphere, partnering with Nicks and her management company BMG on the release. Trafalgar’s primary focus still remains cinemas, Kymberli Frueh, Trafalgar’s SVP Programming & Content Acquisitions, emphasized to Deadline.

“The central reason from Stevie Nicks and the team at BMG for providing a video-on-demand alternative for the 24 Karat Gold concert film was to create options for consumers, ensuring fans feel safe wherever they watch the film and to hedge against uncertainty around market closures and COVID spikes,” Frueh explained.

“Whether it’s outdoor drive in locations, safely opened cinemas or online options, cinemas remain our main focus as they offer a safe communal experience among fans—especially since concerts and touring have stopped for now. Event cinema brings fans together in their local movie theater to enjoy their favorite artists as a community, as if they were at a live concert.

“While the team liked the opportunity from the onset, it became increasingly important when some cinema chains closed all locations due to lack of new film releases. As COVID concerns continue to keep NY and LA closed, outdoor and online became even more critical as viewing options as these are core markets for fans,” she said.

The film entered cinemas around the world on October 21 and reached number one in the UK and number two in the U.S.; it played in around 900 cinemas worldwide.

Directed and produced by Joe Thomas during Nick’s 67-city sold out 24 Karat Gold Tour, the film explores the inspirations behind some of the musician’s most know songs from her times as a member of Fleetwood Mac and as a solo artist.

BOX OFFICE STATS






Monday, October 26, 2020

STEVIE NICKS PLANS SOLO TOUR WHEN THE WORLD GETS BACK TO NORMAL


Stevie Nicks on Her New Concert Film, the ‘Crazy’ Resurgence of ‘Dreams’ and Staying in Touch With the Spirits of Prince and Tom Petty

In a wide-ranging Q&A, the singer discusses everything from a life-changing moment seeing the "Woodstock" movie at a drive-in to having her own new "24 Karat Gold: The Concert" film play at outdoor and indoor theaters.

By Chris Willman - Variety

Not that it ever was far from rock fans’ consciousness, but Stevie Nicks’ voice is suddenly a ubiquitous part of popular culture again, thanks to a viral video of a skateboarding man singing along to Fleetwood Mac’s “Dreams” that has become the feel-good hit of a feel-bad fall season. Naturally, the snippet of it has made a hungry world ready again to consume more of “Dreams” than can fit in a TikTok video, which is why “Dreams” and the “Rumours” album have both returned to the top 10, 43 years later.

But if the resurgence has led you to want to hear not just “Dreams” but two hours and 10 minutes of unexpurgated Stevie, the universe has conspired to accommodate that. Sunday night, Nicks’ film, “24 Karat Gold: The Movie,” will be playing at theaters and drive-ins across the country. It’ll be followed Friday by the release of a full soundtrack on CD (as a Target exclusive), on vinyl (at Barnes & Noble) and for download, further capturing a 2017 show in Pittsburgh that found Nicks at what she considers her well-oiled performing peak. Its rendering of something that seems impossible now — an arena gig — really does feel like a dream.

Nicks got on the phone with Variety earlier this month, just as the “Dreams” phenomenon was starting to take off, to discuss the making of the new concert movie, a new studio single (“Show Them the Way”), her Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction last year, feeling like she’s still in touch with Tom Petty and Prince, how the “Woodstock” film changed her life, hopes and fears about the coronavirus crisis, and the importance of suede boots on the ground.

VARIETY: One of the songs in this concert film is “Dreams.” As you know, there’s this whole TikTok video tie-in, and suddenly “Dreams” is on the chart again.

NICKS: From the skateboarder? I know. How crazy is that? My assistant showed it to me — he’s drinking his juice and just skateboarding along and just filming himself and singing “Dreams.” It’s so funny, and so great, because “Dreams” is a fun song to sing. I’m thrilled that people still love it, and that it does still make people happy. And who knows even why? But it does. But “Dreams” came out how many years ago? Like in 1975, right? [Editor’s note: early 1977.] My assistant just told me there’s a lot of young kids who don’t even know the song, but they like it, and its streaming is massive. It’s fantastic.

Top 40 Radio Revives Fleetwood Mac’s Classic ‘Dreams.’


After Viral Video, Top 40 Radio Revives Fleetwood Mac’s Classic ‘Dreams.’

Oct 26, 2020 - Inside Radio

A new generation of listeners is discovering the Fleetwood Mac classic “Dreams” thanks to a viral TikTok video posted by Nathan Apodaca riding a skateboard, lip-synching the song while sipping a large bottle of Ocean Spray Cran-Raspberry. The 23-second video has been viewed millions of times, sparking a resurgence of the song from the 1997 Fleetwood Mac album “Rumours.”

The track accumulated 521 total spins the week of Oct. 19-25, according to Mediabase, with Top 40 radio leading the way with 248 or nearly half of the total spins. The song moved from No. 96 on the Mediabase Top 40 chart to No. 59 week-over-week.

Louie Diaz, Cumulus Media VP/Contemporary who programs Atlanta’s “Q99.7” WWWQ, gave a head’s up to his airstaff when the song started showing up on the music log every three hours. “We will treat it like a current song,” he wrote in a memo acquired by Atlanta Journal-Constitution radio and TV reporter Rodney Ho. “So, when you hear it into the Weeknd or Post Malone on Q99.7, don’t think it’s weird.”

He told Ho he’s not sure how long the song will be a taking up a spot on the current list, but says “Dreams” doesn’t sound out of place and is one of the top three most checked songs in the market on Shazam.

The viral video helped placed the song back on Rolling Stone’s Top 100 Songs Chart and the band notched its best-ever week on streaming, NPR reports. In its first hour on TikTok, the video gathered some 100,000 views. It now has more than 35 million. TikTok says 134,000 tribute videos have been made, totaling nearly a half-billion combined views.

The band has also noticed, with Mick Fleetwood telling NPR, the video “was spontaneous. It was heartfelt. It was fun, and God knows we need some of that right now... It could have been any song, but it was ours.”

Stevie Nicks, whose vocals Apodaca sings along to in the video, told “CBS This Morning,” “This TikTok thing has, kind of, blown my mind. And I’m happy about it because it seems to have made so many people happy.”

The newfound love for a classic song is not unusual. In the past it was movies and commercial campaigns that revived a song. After its prominence in the movie Wayne’s World, “Bohemian Rhapsody” by Queen returned to the Top 40 charts. Similar occurrences took place with Ben E. King’s “Stand By Me,” featured in the 1986 movie of the same name; “Unchained Melody” by the Righteous Brothers from “Ghost” and even “I Heard it Through the Grapevine” by Marvin Gaye, which blew up thanks to an animated commercial campaign for California raisins, commissioned by the California Raisin Advisory Board in the 1980s.

STEVIE NICKS 24 KARAT GOLD CONCERT ON DEMAND AVAILABLE OCT 29th


For the first time ever, get a virtual front-row seat to the magic that Stevie Nicks brings to the stage - from the comfort and the safety of your home! Recorded over two nights during her sold-out 24 Karat Gold Tour, this feature-length concert film features a set-list of fan favorites and rare gems from Stevie’s multi-platinum selling catalog. The film also highlights Stevie’s intuitive and intimate storytelling abilities, captivating audiences with personal stories behind some of the most famous songs in music history.

PRE-ORDER TODAY

Premium video streaming access for Stevie Nicks 24 Karat Gold The Concert will begin October 29 at 9:00am PST / 12:00pm EST, with purchase available through November 5, 2020 at 11:59 PM PST. The event will be available for replay for 48 hours following purchase and is not available for download.

Please note your 48-hour viewing period will begin as soon as it is made available on October 29.




STEVIE NICKS 'because of “Show Them the Way” I will make another record'


Stevie Nicks on Why Payback Is Coming For Trump Post-Coronavirus and Plans for New Album

"I never thought that I would’ve gone underground so heavily as I have," says Nicks of struggling to find inspiration amidst the pandemic.


By Lyndsey Havens - Billboard
10/26/2020

When Stevie Nicks was my age, she tells me, she had just joined Fleetwood Mac at 27.

“I remember the phone call,” she says, calling from her Los Angeles home’s landline late on Saturday night. “I remember scheduling a dinner the next day and meeting for Mexican food somewhere in Hollywood where it was all decided. It’s just like yesterday to me; I can smell the amazing smells of enchiladas and tacos and tamales, and see all of their beautiful faces. We were so young, but it just seems like I could reach out and touch that night.”

Now, Nicks is 72 -- and enjoying the unexpected return of Fleetwood Mac’s “Dreams” and Rumours back on the charts at No. 12 on the Hot 100 and No. 7 on the Billboard 200, respectively. Meanwhile, Nicks herself just topped the Billboard Songwriter’s Chart.

It’s all thanks to the now famous TikTok; yes, that one with user doggface208 longboarding and sipping some Ocean Spray while vibing out to “Dreams.” Since he posted it to the platform, the clip has raked in 65.5 million views, and inspired everyone from Mick Fleetwood, Shakira and even Nicks herself to join in with their own renditions.

She says she’s “tickled pink” at the virality of her decades-old hit, and shares one important piece of advice: “If the young kids start listening to Fleetwood Mac, start with the first album and just go through them. Sit down and be in it for the long run, and you’ll have the best time.”

She also relates the moment currently being experienced by doggface208 (real name: Nathan Apodaca) to her own unexpected early-'70s breakthrough with Fleetwood Mac. “We all do silly, creative dumb things that we never think anybody is going to care about, and the fact that [this TikTok user] just reached out to the entire world with his 10-second ride… his life will never be the same. In a strange way, it’s kind of like when Lindsey and I joined [the band] and we had no money -- and I do mean no money -- and within eight months, together we were almost a millionaire.”

Now, Nicks is a millionaire many times over on her own accord, and has celebrated one victory after the next throughout her career, whether historic accomplishments like becoming the first (and still only) woman to be inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame twice, or personal triumphs like participating in her first Zoom during the ongoing pandemic (she says the concept is “terrifying”).

And even though the icon has made her hatred of our current reality well known -- she refuses to contract the coronavirus, saying “I have put a clear plastic ring of angels around my body” -- she’s still managed to find pockets of creativity this year, resulting in her anticipated concert film, Live In Concert: The 24 Karat Gold Tour, which hit select theaters and drive-ins for two nights only last weekend, and powerful new pop-rock single, “Show Them The Way,” her first piece of new music in six years.

With so much to celebrate, it’s odd for Nicks to be lounging at home. “One more reason to hate this pandemic is that if this hadn’t been going on, I would have been out in the world [right now],” she says. “The only connection that I really have to all of this is doing these interviews.”

How does it feel to be back in the spotlight while also stuck at home?


Sunday, October 25, 2020

Singer, songwriter, superstar Stevie Nicks is getting a little restless these days.


Rock star Stevie Nicks, in her own words

CBS Sunday Morning Interview with Tracy Smith

Singer, songwriter, superstar Stevie Nicks is getting a little restless these days.

The pandemic has put performances for large audiences on hold so she's waiting to take the stage again, and, as she told "CBS Sunday Morning's" Tracy Smith last week, the waiting is the hardest part.

"It seems like, for so many creative people, this is a very creative time. But, also, time is slipping away," Smith said to Nicks.

"Time is being stolen from all of us," Nicks said. "Absolutely. Especially if you're 72 years old."

"Does that weigh on you?" Smith asked.


"Yeah, it does," Nicks said. "When you're really working, you really stay young. You stay young because you have to."  "But, when you're just sitting around in your house, I think that Old Man Time starts to get ahold of you," the Fleetwood Mac singer continued.

Still, it seems that Old Man Time has always been kind to Stevie Nicks. You can see it in her just-released feature film, "24 Karat Gold the Concert," where she looks and sounds pretty much the same as she always did.  The movie will stream soon, but for the moment it's being shown in socially distanced theaters.

"It's as close to a really big rock 'n roll concert in a big venue as you're gonna get," Nicks said.

And it's not the only way Stevie is making herself heard these days. She decided to release her first new song in six years, "Show them the Way," as a call for action on the eve of the election.

And now, some of her classic tunes are suddenly climbing the charts again. Thanks to a cranberry-juice-loving Idaho skateboarder who went viral after posting a video on TikTok featuring Fleetwood Mac's "Dreams."

"So four decades after 'Dreams' and 'Rumours' came out, they're both in the top 10 again," Smith said.

"I know," Nicks said.

The video has inspired quite a few imitators, including bandmate Mick Fleetwood. And last week, one from Nicks herself.

"This TikTok thing has, kind of, blown my mind," Nicks said. "And I'm happy about it because it seems to have made so many people happy."

You could say making people happy has been Stevie Nicks' calling for the past 50 years or so,  And after a career of platinum-selling albums and sold-out concerts, she became the first and, so far, only woman to be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame twice.

"It's 22 men that are in twice for their solo work and being in a big band," Nicks said. "And no women."

"Until you," Smith said.

"Until me," Nicks said. "So I feel that I definitely broke a big rock 'n roll glass ceiling."

And her backstory is just as legendary.

When young Stevie dropped out of college to chase her musical dreams, her parents cut her off financially. So she waited tables and cleaned houses to support herself and her then-boyfriend, guitarist Lindsey Buckingham.

"Were there moments when you were cleaning, I mean, you were like cleaning houses, what, scrubbing toilets, mopping floors. Was there a moment when you thought, 'Ooh, I made a mistake?'" Smith asked.

"No. No, because I was doing that to support my music, my music pal, Lindsey and some other friends, too, you know, that didn't have hardly anything," Nicks said. "So I was the one who actually was able to pay the rent and pay the money to keep our Toyota running. And so it's like, I didn't mind at all, because I did not expect my boyfriend, Lindsey, to get a job. Because what in the world would he do?"

"So you had to be the one?" Smith said.

"It was all about me," Nicks said.

By the time she became a member of Fleetwood Mac, she almost expected to be underestimated. So she had an arrangement with the group's other female star, Christine McVie.

"You two stuck together through thick and thin and really had each other's backs," Smith said.

"Yeah, we did," Nicks said. "And Christine and I, we made a pact at the very beginning that if we were ever in a room of super famous guitar players that didn't treat us with the respect that we thought that we deserved, that we would just stand up and say, 'This party's over,' and we would walk out."

"And did you have to do that?" Smith asked.

"We never actually did have to do that," Nicks said. "So that was a nice surprise. We never had to make a scene."

And their friendship endures.

Stevie Nicks' romantic relationships seemed to be more of a challenge, but they inspired some great music.

"Have you had a love," Smith asked, "a great love in your life?"

"Yeah. Three. But it's not easy to be Mr. Stevie Nicks," Nicks said. "Even if you happen to be Mr. Really Famous Rock Star Guy."

"So Lindsey falls in that category?" Smith asked. "The great loves?"

"Oh, absolutely. Well, not exactly," Nicks said. "Lindsey is — has his own category. Lindsey was my great musical love. That's different."

Stevie Nicks' dad once told her she'd never marry because her music would always come first. He was wrong, she was briefly married once. But dad was also right.

For Stevie Nicks, music will always be her true love.

"When I'm 90 years old," Nicks said, "I don't wanna be laying in my big, gorgeous bedroom and, you know, with music playing and 15 little Chinese crested dogs and going like, 'Ugh, I'm so broken-hearted that I didn't find the one.'"

"And then I would have to answer myself and say, 'Yes, but you did find several "the ones" who you wrote really great songs about and that's why you're living in this absolutely spectacular house with everything that you want and anything that you could possibly wanna buy,'" Nicks continued. "And it's, like, so maybe this is just all the way your dad saw it when he said, 'Stevie will never get married.'"

"And the way it's supposed to be," Smith said.




Saturday, October 24, 2020

Returning to her 2017 live shows proved to be a godsend for Stevie Nicks


Stevie Nicks Can’t Wait for the Magic to Come Back

Nicks discusses her ’24 Karat Gold Concert Film’ and returning to live shows in new interview


By Brittany Spanos - Rollingstone
Photo: Randee St Nicholas

In another life, Stevie Nicks would have been a music-film editor. “I think I’m really good at it,” she says one Friday evening, calling from her home in Los Angeles. Her canine companion Lily is begging for her attention with a toy as Nicks reflects on her second life. “I can only say this about a few things.”

She’s had plenty of experience, working closely with director Joe Thomas on concert films for Fleetwood Mac (2004’s Live in Boston), her late friend Tom Petty (2006’s Live From Gainesville), and most recently, Stevie Nicks 24 Karat Gold Concert Film. Recorded during her 2017 tour stops in Indianapolis and Pittsburgh, the film is getting a special release this month and being screened at select drive-ins, theaters, and exhibition spaces on October 21st through 25th. The set lists featured classic solo and Nicks-led Fleetwood Mac songs along with tracks off her 2014 album, 24 Karat Gold: Songs From the Vault. For the music fans desperately missing live shows in the time of Covid-19, the film perfectly encapsulates the tambourine-banging, shawl-twirling, story-spinning magic that only Nicks can deliver.

Putting the project together with Thomas became one of two pandemic projects for the rock goddess (the other being her new song “Show Them the Way”). She flew out to Chicago in May with her assistant on a “full-on, fogged-out, Covid-free private plane” and lived in a house on a golf course that no one had been in since before lockdown had begun. Nicks would go to Thomas’ studio, masked up alongside everyone else (“I felt imprisoned by the mask, but I love the mask — I felt safe”), and got to work, diligently assessing the footage captured by all 12 cameras from shows in the two cities.

“I’m really the second editor,” she says of her uncredited job. “The fact is that if I don’t like a shot, it’s not going in.” She learned, as she had in past editing-room experiences, that men see women differently.



Stevie Nicks hits No. 1 on Billboard's Hot 100 Songwriters chart


Stevie Nicks Tops Hot 100 Songwriters Chart Thanks to Fleetwood Mac 'Dreams' Resurgence

Xander Zellner - Billboard
October 21, 2020

She solely wrote the 1977 smash.

Stevie Nicks hits No. 1 on Billboard's Hot 100 Songwriters chart (dated Oct. 24), leading for the first time since the chart's 2019 launch, thanks to her writing credit on Fleetwood Mac's "Dreams."

The 1977 classic, and a Billboard Hot 100 No. 1 that June, rises 21-12 in its second week back on the chart, with 16.1 million U.S. streams (up 20%) and 25,000 downloads sold (up 15%), according to Nielsen Music/MRC Data. It pushes 3-2 on the Digital Song Sales chart and 18-6 on Streaming Songs.

Even in quarantine Stevie Nicks is not slowing down!


Stevie Nicks is still dreaming

by - Greg Wetherall - Dazed
October 20, 2020
Photo: Randee St Nicholas

She’s just released her first solo single in six years. A new concert film is about to hit cinemas. And a viral TikTok has put the Fleetwood Mac classic Rumours back in the Top 10. Even in quarantine, the rock and roll icon is not slowing down.

Stevie Nicks has had “a hell of a day”. Not only is it 3am at her home in Los Angeles when we first speak on the phone, the power has gone out in her house. “It was out all day until about nine o’clock (in the evening), but we’ve not been here,” she laments. “We got home and it was on. I came in, got ready to do this interview, and the power went out again.”

Nicks, the 72-year-old Fleetwood Mac singer and solo star, is almost entirely nocturnal these days. The coronavirus pandemic and subsequent quarantine has locked her into a diet of rolling news and perpetual worry, and being awake and active during the witching hour has become her normal. Her current lack of electricity, however, is somewhat less so. “We are prepared here, just in case there’s an earthquake,” she continues (the ‘we’ referring to her assistant and two goddaughters, who Nicks has been holed up with ever since the pandemic struck). “We have a lot of lanterns. I’m in a window seat in a swing. We’ve lit the area so at least I can see the papers in front of me.” Our conversation unfurls to breaking news that Donald Trump has tested positive for COVID-19. “When everyone wakes up in the morning and discovers that the whole government has possibly been exposed to the virus, they’re gonna go crazy,” she remarks, adding that Trump contracting the virus proves that wearing a mask is “not political... it’s contagious and it’s dangerous”.

To speak with Stevie Nicks is to spend time with one of music’s true greats. Not only is she responsible for writing some of the rock and pop canon’s greatest standards – “Dreams”, “Landslide”, “Edge of Seventeen” – her life has been so eventful that it can include opening up for Janis Joplin and Jimi Hendrix, to turning down Prince’s offer to record “Purple Rain” among its many, many tales. When we talk, she’s just arrived home from the edit suite, where she’s been busy applying the finishing touches to the video for “Show Them the Way”, her first solo single in six years.


Stevie Nicks can’t wait to perform with Harry Styles again when this is all through

Stevie Nicks Just Wants to Keep Telling Stories

by Keaton Bell - Vogue
October 20, 2020
Photo: Randee St Nicholas

Stevie Nicks bought her first copy of Vogue when she was 25 years old. It was 1973, around the time of Buckingham Nicks, the first and only album she and ex-boyfriend Lindsey Buckingham ever released as a duo. Still a few years removed from the fame and fortune that would follow their recruitment into Fleetwood Mac, Nicks was earning just a buck fifty an hour waiting tables in a flapper girl uniform.

“I only had enough money for one magazine at that point, and Vogue was the first one I ever bought,” Nicks recalls. “I would scrape my money together and buy it every month.” 

Five decades later, Nicks—who prefers using a landline and doesn’t own a computer—still finds comfort in her lo-fi rituals. “To this day my favorite thing is getting into bed at five o’clock in the morning with a cup of decaf coffee, playing some soft, groovy music, and reading my Vogue,” she tells me. “Me and my little dog Lily pore over every single page for hours, and it’s been that way since 1973.”

Nicks has spent most of the pandemic in her Pacific Palisades home with two close friends and the aforementioned Lily—a Chinese crested who sits dutifully on her owner’s lap during our call. “She has her back turned to me because she doesn’t really wanna be here. I just know she’s plotting her escape,” Nicks says with a raspy giggle. “It’s fine. My feelings aren’t too hurt…well, they are, but I’ll be okay.”

As Fleetwood Mac’s lovelorn frontwoman, Nicks crafted masterworks out of the sex-and-drug-fueled dalliances that almost destroyed the group (documented in real time on their 1977 breakup opus Rumours). Still one of the 10 best-selling albums of all time, Rumours made stars out of its new lineup, but it was always clear from the outset who the breakout was. With three songwriters fighting for space on each record, it wasn’t long before Nicks needed her own outlet.

“They said, ‘You can make your solo album and have a solo trip, but if we go into work, we’re gonna call you,’” she remembers. “‘Terrific, I’ll be there.’ That was always my promise to them.” 1981’s shimmery Bella Donna set the stage for a second career that made Nicks the first woman to ever be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame twice (once with the group in 1998 and by herself just last year).

2020 was originally meant to be a year off from the grueling lifestyle that comes with back-to-back arena tours as both Fleetwood Mac frontwoman and solo enchantress. With just one festival show a month, Nicks would slow down. Then the shows—her headlining slots at Jazz Fest and Governors Ball were early casualties—began to be canceled.