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Inside Charles Kelley & Stevie Nicks' 'Southern Accents'Country singer shares stories and exclusive photos from his recording session with the Fleetwood Mac legend
BY CHRIS PARTON
Rollingstone.com
Charles Kelley has always been a huge Tom Petty fan and holds a special love for the 1985 song "Southern Accents," part of an album of the same name. He says he thought the homesick ballad would make a great country song and had long wanted to cut it with his band, Lady Antebellum, but they never got the chance.
In an exclusive interview with Rolling Stone Country, though, the expressive singer and native son of the South explains how an opportunity finally presented itself with his first solo project, The Driver. . . but it turned out much different than expected.
"Growing up in Georgia, it reminded me a lot of my dad," Kelley says. "He's a very spiritual person and the way he works, the way he prays, it's definitely that old-school Southern thing. So I always thought it would be a cool little homage to him."
Kelley recorded a demo version of the song in straightforward fashion and was happy with the result, but then fate intervened in the form rock legend Stevie Nicks. The Fleetwood Mac singer had become friends with Kelley and his Lady A bandmates through their CMT Crossroads collaboration and the song "Golden" — a Lady A track that spoke to Nicks so much she asked to re-record it with the trio — and during a trip to Nashville, Nicks heard Kelley was working on a solo album. After hearing the early cut of "Southern Accents" she felt inspired once again to join in, and although Kelley didn't envision his version of the song as a duet, you don't turn down Stevie Nicks.
The pair wound up at the Village Studios in Los Angeles, and their remarkable session was captured on film for a new video and intimate photo series. Coincidentally, they recorded Kelley's "Southern Accents" redo in the very same room where Petty cut his original version.
Full story at Rollingstone
