What does the iconic Stevie Nicks bring on tour in 2024? Gold, glitter, glam, her legendary capes

Photo: Raymond Van Olphen (bulletray on IG)

Stevie Nicks in the Ziggo Dome (live review)

Amsterdam July 19, 2024

By Esmee de Gooyer

Lust For Life

What does the iconic Stevie Nicks bring on tour in 2024? Gold, glitter, glam, her legendary capes and one of the most beautiful voices in the world. But also a lot of sadness because of the loss of her loved ones.

The Ziggo Dome was not sold out, despite it being a seated show, but that probably has more to do with the ticket price than with the popularity of Stevie Nicks. She is – still – not only a musical icon but also a style icon for all generations, as evidenced by the outfits of the visitors. Top hats, shawls and capes, black lace, puff sleeves, wide skirts, black boots, wild curls. Clearly inspired by the style of the Fleetwood Mac legend, who also displayed her 'witchy' image in American Horror Story: Coven.

Ode to her lost friends

Tonight she will play a mix of 'her' Fleetwood Mac songs, solo work and a few well-chosen covers. But above all she will pay tribute to the people she has lost. Starting with Tom Petty, who plays an important role in the setlist from the intro song Runnin' Down A Dream. Although it is a seated show, everyone in the audience immediately stands up at the first notes. But don't worry: for those who suddenly can't see anything of the stage anymore, Stevie Nicks can be followed in no less than four places on the screens.

What immediately stands out in the first song: her voice is still good, although she sings a little lower than she used to and with slightly less compelling emotions. When Outside The Rain (Bella Donna) seamlessly flows into Dreams by Fleetwood Mac, a mother and her teenage daughter go crazy for me. Stevie also seems to be enjoying herself: even for her it is apparently special to be in Amsterdam. “Let's get this Amsterdam party started!”

Tom Petty

With Stop Draggin' My Heart Around, Stevie and her band bring Tom Petty closer. She enthusiastically tells the story behind the song, although most fans probably already know it. It was the first song he gave to Nicks – and it became her first solo hit. “That man you're always pining over, wishing you were in his band, he has a song for you”, she was told by her producer Jimmy Iovine. At the time, he was working on Bella Donna and the Tom Petty And The Heartbreakers album Hard Promises at the same time. “I went to the studio completely overdressed, and Tom Petty was so casual!” They recorded it in a few days, although she now tells us that she was actually sad that it ended so quickly.

The parts that Tom Petty sang back then are now performed by Waddy Wachtel, who was also in the studio in 1981 as a guitarist. But he also sings very well. In the background, not only photos of the young Stevie with Tom Petty on stage and in the studio are projected, but also other icons such as Bob Dylan, Prince and Joni Mitchell pass by. Nicks calls the song the beginning of the Stevie Nicks band. Now that Petty is no longer there, she feels it is important to let him know how much she still appreciates that. Later, she also plays a cover of Free Fallin'. This feels even more like an ode to Stevie's friend and idol, with a matching photo slideshow.

“I don't want to be a cleaning lady!”

Tonight's other cover is the Buffalo Springfield song For What It's Worth. She's known since she was eighteen that she would one day record a version of it ('in all my arrogance') and in 2022 she did indeed release the song as a single. That one long outburst in the song gets a lot of applause. Then she really goes into chatterbox mode, and catches herself not knowing what story she wants to tell anymore, because she has so many. It becomes the moment that she and Lindsey Buckingham - then still virtually unknown as Buckingham Nicks, she had a part-time job as a cleaner - meet the other Fleetwood Mac members for the first time. They clicked enormously, especially between Stevie and Christine McVie. But afterwards Buckingham said: "I don't wanna be a blues guitarist..." Nicks replied firmly: "But I don't want to be a cleaning lady!"

Gold, glitter, glam

For Bella Donna, she brings out the first cape of the evening. The real, original Bella Donna cape, she says. She actually didn't want to take it with her ("Been there, done that"), but she was persuaded: your audience wants to see them! And that's absolutely true. The Stand Back cape, which is almost falling apart from age, also makes an appearance. Stand Back is a highlight of the show: screaming guitars, gold, glitter, glam. That line is continued in Gold Dust Woman, an impressive longer version of the Fleetwood Mac classic (complete with gold cape).

She sings the beautiful Leather And Lace with her vocal coach and band member Steve Real, who has a terribly beautiful voice and is actually not inferior to Don Henley. For a moment the song goes through marrow and bone. This sensitive moment is quickly over when the intro of Edge Of Seventeen is milked to increase the tension. Was this an ode to Prince?

“I'm gonna make it”

“There are no live recordings of us, there's just us,” Stevie reminds us, thanking us for being there. The encore is a real treat: Rhiannon and Landslide, the second with Christine McVie in dozens of photos. It's hard to hold back the tears, for the song itself and all the loss Nicks has to live with. All night I've been wondering how she does it, how she keeps going and singing without breaking down. And now, at the end of the show, the answer comes. This is a night where she explains, and she doesn't always do that. The stage is her coping mechanism, ever since she was a little kid. “Whenever I'm sad, I run to the stage. It keeps me going. When I'm here, I know I'm gonna make it. I'm gonna make it.”

For What It's Worth

Rhiannon