Ten years have passed since Stevie Nicks released her last solo album, but she's still the same gay-loved goddess of earthy rock she built her legend on. The new release, In Your Dreams, is exactly how the gypsy queen left usâ┚¬â€Âwith that uniform sense of mystical otherworldliness that's made Nicks a go-her-own-way virtuoso since her days with Fleetwood Mac. White horses, vampire tales and ethereal love parables all seep into this set, Nick's first all-new studio project after reuniting with Fleetwood Mac for 2003's Say You Will.
Nicks recently spoke with us about taking a trip to â┚¬Å”the magical world of fairies and angels,â┚¬Â the dress drag queens love, and how her own music motivated her to lose a dozen pounds.
WATERMARK: Why did it take so long to release another solo album?
STEVIE NICKS: Even though I haven't made another solo record in 10 years, I've been making music solid since Trouble in Shangri-La. I came off the road from 135 shows in 2005 with Fleetwood Mac and was going to make a record, and the business people around me said, â┚¬Å”We don't think you should do it because the music business is in chaosâ┚¬ÂÂâ┚¬â€Âyou know, with internet piracy, which was really hitting us in the face in 2005â┚¬â€Ââ┚¬Å”and it's just going to be a really emotional pull on you. We don't think you should do it. Tour while you can, do big shows and sell lots of tickets, that's what you can do.â┚¬Â And I just was stupid enough to kind of go, â┚¬Å”OK.â┚¬ÂÂ
When did you wise up?
At the end of the Fleetwood Mac tour in 2009. We were in Australia, and I wrote the â┚¬Å”Moonlightâ┚¬Â song [from In Your Dreams] there, and when I got done with that songâ┚¬â€ÂI started it in Melbourne and I finished it in Brisbaneâ┚¬â€Âthere was a piano. I stood up and I said to my assistant, â┚¬Å”I'm ready to make a record now.â┚¬ÂÂ
The concept of the video for the first single, â┚¬Å”Secret Love,â┚¬Â is intriguingâ┚¬â€Âit merges your older self with your younger self. How do you feel now versus then?
That's why the little girl that's in the video, Kelly, is wearing the green outfit that was my first colored outfit made in 1976. I wanted Kelly to be the 25-year-old Stevie, and then there's the older Stevie. That song was written in 1975, so I wanted the spirits to blend. That's why you see her leaving the white horse and then you see me leaving the white horse and then we're both together, because in my dreams as a little girl that white horse was very important.
[While shooting the video] we looked down out of my bedroom window and saw this horseâ┚¬â€Âand there was a fog machine on and the actual sun was coming through all the evergreens in my backyardâ┚¬â€Âand I was like, â┚¬Å”That can't possibly be real.â┚¬Â If that horse had a horn you would've thought, â┚¬Å”Okay, I've died and gone to fairyland.â┚¬ÂÂ
Let's talk about those fairies, because you know a lot of gays adore you.
I know. I'm glad. All these visions that I see, I love when people get them. Sometimes people don't get it, you know, and I love when people do, because I think that everybody needs to move into that magical world sometimes. A lot of people do not ever move into the magical land of fairies and angels and they just live in the hardcore miserable world that this world is right now. It's chaotic, horrible, there's nothing we can doâ┚¬â€Âit's such a bummer.
When did you know you were a gay icon?
When â┚¬Å”Night of a Thousand Steviesâ┚¬Â [a New York City-based salute to Stevie Nicks featuring impersonators] started happening 20 years ago, it was a clue. And you know, I always felt it was because I was not a fashion statement like Madonna was. I'm very different than her; she's very chameleonesque. That little outfit that Kelly is wearing is exactly the same as the black outfit I have on in the video. The eye makeup she has on is
the makeup that I've been wearing since high school. I don't change much.
Right. You stay very true to yourself, and I think a lot of gay people can admire that because we strive for that, too.
I do, and I think that brings a little bit of comfort to my audience. I still have the two girls singing with me, because I love them and they're my dear friends. But I could've been changing background singers every year, and I chose to stay with Sharon [Celani] and Lori [Nicks] because the sound of the three of us is comforting to my audience. And those clothes are comforting to my audience.
Glee recently dedicated an entire episode to Fleetwood Mac's Rumours album. How do you feel about having your work on a show that's been so controversial regarding using other artists' songs?
You know, I went down there when they were doing â┚¬Å”Landslideâ┚¬Â and I stayed there for six hours and watched them film the whole thing. I watched Gwyneth [Paltrow] and Brittany [Heather Morris] and Santana [Naya Rivera] sing the song 50 times, and I had such a good time. What I was very touched by was that Lea Michele, who plays Rachel, said to me, â┚¬Å”You know, in all the big songs that we've done, which is many, nobody's ever called us or come down or even written a note thanking us for doing â┚¬ËœJessie's Girl' or a Journey song.â┚¬Â They do such great versions of all these songs; the original writers cannot fault them. They're magnificentâ┚¬â€Âevery one of them. And she goes, â┚¬Å”Nobody except you has ever come down and told us that they thought we were doing a good job.â┚¬Â And I thought that was so sad. Very, very disrespectful.
As someone whose music has spanned many generations, how does it feel working with a new generation of performers like the Glee cast or, for instance, Taylor Swift at the Grammys?
I love that. A lot of the songs they love are songs that I wrote when I was really young. â┚¬Å”Landslideâ┚¬Â was written in 1973; I was 27. I may sing it now at 62, but I was 27 when I wrote that song. It's not like they love a song that was written by a 62-year-old woman. They love a song that was written by a 27-year-old girl. So I'm thrilled, and I don't write any differently now than I did when I was 27. I just go to the pianoâ┚¬â€Âinspired by something that happens to meâ┚¬â€Âwith a cup of tea, incense burning and the fire in the fireplace.
