Australian Articles - Stevie Nicks

Twilight inspires new dream run for Stevie
The Sunday Telegraph Australia June 26, 2011

STEVIE Nicks is in a good mood. The international star of folk rock is celebrating the success of her first album for a decade and has just heard a stadium full of fans sing Happy Birthday to her.

‘‘ It was pretty amazing,’’ she says. ‘‘ Not the best singers in the world, but they put their hearts into it.’’

It’s a testament to Nicks’ popularity and that of her former band, Fleetwood Mac — resurgent in recent months after the TV show Glee dedicated an entire episode to their 1977 album, Rumours.

Back on form after a hiatus, the singer says she began writing her new album, In Your Dreams, after a show with Fleetwood Mac in Melbourne while touring in Australia.

She’d just watched New Moon — the second film in the Twilight series — and was so moved by the love affair between Bella (Kristen Stewart) and Edward (Robert Pattinson), it inspired her.

Drawing parallels with her own doomed relationship with Lindsey Buckingham of Fleetwood Mac, she wrote Moonlight, a track on the new album. She says: ‘‘ It really touched me, because that kind of thing happened to me once and it was just so devastating.’’

When the band arrived in Brisbane there was a piano in her suite and In Your Dreams was born. She explains: ‘‘ It’s just that forbidden love . . . love that cannot work — no matter what. Edward is beautiful and sensitive and sweet, but he’s still a monster. That’s the main underlying story in all fairy tales.

‘‘ But sometimes it happens to you in real life and when it does, it’s devastating.’’

Nicks met Buckingham in San Francisco when she was 17. The couple joined Fleetwood Mac, which ultimately sounded the death knell for their relationship.

They split while making Rumours, and Nicks says the turmoil she went through is what makes her identify with Bella and Edward.

Later she sang with his band, Fritz, before the pair moved to Los Angeles and performed as Buckingham-Nicks, living and recording together for five years.

‘‘ That’s when we realised we had a destiny, I think,’’ Nicks says. ‘‘ In the movie when she’s sitting in the bay window and it goes October, November, December and she’s still sitting there, I went through that at one part (of) my life and it just brought it flooding back.’’

Despite their messy parting, Nicks, now 63, says she and Buckingham remain friends. He also worked on In Your Dreams.

‘‘ He came and played on Soldiers Angel and he really saved the day on that one,’’ she says.

‘‘ I think that really is a super tie between us because I think that song’s going to last forever.’’

THE TWILIGHT FILM NEW MOON HAS HAD A PROFOUND EFFECT ON STEVIE NICKS, WRITES AMANDA HORSWILL

Sunday Magazine Australia June 26, 2011

IT WAS just after she had seen the Twilight film New Moon while on tour in Australia. Stevie Nicks was so taken by the fated love story that she stole upstairs to her Melbourne hotel room and wrote a fivepage essay about iconic love affairs.

She wrote about Bella and Edward, about Beauty and the Beast and about her own love story, between herself and her musical partner in life, Lindsey Buckingham, of Fleetwood Mac.

The similarities between their story and Bella and Edward’s in New Moon were uncanny. A forbidden love. A love that cannot work, she describes it.

She went back to see the film to reflect on it again.

Meanwhile, a united Fleetwood Mac were playing sell-out shows around Australia. When they got to Brisbane, her hotel room contained a piano.

Nicks sat down at the piano, the love story of Bella and Edward fresh in her mind, its metaphors and messages still relevant, and out poured a collection of notes and words that were to become the song Moonlight.

Having no recording equipment, she recorded the song on video camera. ‘‘ When I was done, I got up, went in and said to my assistant ‘ I’m ready to make a record now’,’’ Nicks says. ‘‘ It was so great because had there not been a piano there, it may not have been written.’’

That was the beginnings of In Your Dreams, Stevie Nicks’s first record in 10 years. The record has received great response from critics and the public alike, becoming a top 10 album in the US.

Today, Nicks is chatting on the phone from her home in Los Angeles. She’s in good spirits because just last night she celebrated her 63rd birthday at a special showcase gig in Los Angeles. She was joined on stage by Buckingham, who plays on the record, Dave Stewart of Eurythmics fame, her cosongwriter and producer of the record, and fellow songwriter Mike Campbell of Tom Petty’s Heartbreakers.

The crowd ended up singing Happy Birthday to her. ‘‘ Not the best singers in the world, but they put their heart into it,’’ she says. It’s a fantastic next chapter for the famous gypsy queen, who has managed to retain her status as an icon of romantic rock.

The record gives an insight into Stevie Nicks’s world, not only her Twilight fascination but also her love of other gothic literary works.

Annabel Lee is based on a poem by Edgar Allan Poe. The rockin’ Wide Sargasso Sea is based on the 1966 novel by Jean Rhys as a prequel to Jane Eyre. In the upbeat song New Orleans, she sings about wearing feathers and lace, and references Anne Rice, the queen of vampire tales before Stephenie Meyer usurped her throne.

Italian Summer is just that – a song she wrote while on holiday abroad. Her most talked about song, though, is Secret Love, which was written around the time of the Rumours album, but didn’t make the final cut. There has been much speculation about who her secret love is, but Nicks won’t be drawn on his identity.

For this record, she worked closely with Stewart. ‘‘ All the years of Fleetwood Mac, I would basically just give Lindsey a tape or a CD with a song on it and say you can produce it but don’t change it,’’ says Nicks. ‘‘ I had never sat across the coffee table with a guy playing guitar in front of a fireplace and recited a poem and written a song in 10 minutes. This was really something new for me, and very exciting.’’

As well as Buckingham, drummer Mick Fleetwood also contributed to the album. ‘‘ He ( Buckingham) came and played on my song Soldier’s Angel, and he really saved the day on that one,’’ Nicks says. ‘‘ And I think that really is a super tie between us because I think that song’s going to last forever.’’ – Stevie Nicks, Adelaide Entertainment Centre, November 23. Book at Ticketek. Ticketek.