(Review) Classic Nicks, no dream.... Stevie Nicks "In Your Dreams" Album Review

IN YOUR DREAMS
STEVIE NICKS
★★★
Sunday Herald Sun [Australia]

SCOTT PODMORE

SOME things need to stay the same to work best, especially when it comes to veteran rockers such as Stevie Nicks. Old fans don’t really want her to reinvent herself; they want the witchy look (check the album cover), the familiar folk-rock musical style that suits her distinctive nasally but charming vocals and, of course, the storyteller dishing up her tales of loss and loneliness, love and hope.

The album is classic Stevie Nicks, so that’s good news for patient fans who have waited for a decade. For someone who can lay claim to being involved in more than 140 million album sales and more than 40 Top-50 hits since she arrived on the scene in the 1970s with Fleetwood Mac, she deserves respect and age certainly isn’t affecting her musically. To top things off, In Your Dreams was handed to two wise heads in Dave Stewart and Glen Ballard for production duties, while Heartbreakers axeman Mike Campbell chipped in with some polish to co-write two tracks.

It’s the mid-tempo cruisy pop that instantly grabs you in album opener Secret Love and the racier title track, before Nicks reaches out tenderly in New Orleans, a song offering hope to the recovering folk from the Big Easy.

The Lindsey Buckingham/Stevie Nicks chemistry resparks a familiar sound and magic at the back end of the album in Soldier’s Angel, a moody reunion in which Nicks sings over the top of Buckingham’s deft touch on guitar as the pair hit some sweet trademark Fleetwood harmonies.

In Your Dreams sees Nicks on top of her game, producing music that takes you back to a bygone era. And while it won’t pull in many new fans, it will certainly give the older ones something to hold close to their chest.

File between: Fleetwood Mac, Bob Dylan.
Download: "For What It's Worth".