Nicks, Stevie

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Stevie Nicks

Singer, songwriter

Stevie Nicks first came to the attention of rock and pop audiences when she and Lindsey Buckingham joined the already established band Fleetwood Mac in 1975. Her singing and songwriting were responsible for many of the hit singles that brought Fleetwood Mac supergroup status in the late 1970s, including “Rhiannon” and “Dreams.” Though Nicks has continued as a productive member of the band, she has also released several successful solo albums, from 1981 ’s Bella Donna to 1989’s The Other Side of the Mirror. She has had smash duets such as “Whenever I Call You Friend” with Kenny Loggins and “Stop Dragging My Heart Around” with Tom Petty, and popular solo hits, including “Stand Back,” “Talk to Me,” and “Rooms on Fire.”

Nicks was born May 26, 1948, in Phoenix, Arizona. Her father’s stints as an executive with various corporations decreed that she move many times in her childhood and adolescence, living in the states of New Mexico, Texas, Utah, and California. According to Timothy White in his 1984 book Rock Stars, Nicks obtained her introduction to music from her eccentric grandfather, Aaron Jess Nicks, a failed country singer. He taught Stevie the female parts in some old call-and-response country standards well before her fifth birthday, and took her with him to perform in gin mills. Later, in her sophomore year at a Los Angeles, California, high school, Nicks sang with a vocal group modeled on the Mamas and Papas, called Changing Times. But another one of her father’s moves took her to California’s San Francisco Bay area to complete her secondary education.

One of Nicks’s fellow students in her new high school was Lindsey Buckingham. Like Nicks, he was a singer and musician and had already begun to write songs; the two were drawn to one another. Around 1968, after Nicks left San Jose State College without earning a degree, she and Buckingham joined a San Francisco acid rock group named Fritz. By that time the pair was living together, as well as collaborating musically. Nicks told interviewer Jon Pereles in Mademoiselle that Buckingham’s musical arrangements gave her compositions an extra boost: “I need somebody to help me change what I write from a little classical minuet, for piano and lady singer, into a song—I need somebody to put the power into it. Lindsey spoiled me…. I didn’t have to explain much to him—I’d just have to play a song once, and I’d never have to play it again.”

Fritz broke up around 1971, after having first relocated to Los Angeles. Nicks and Buckingham remained there and continued their creative efforts as a duo. They landed a recording contract with Polydor Records, and released one album in 1972, appropriately titled Buckingham-Nicks. The disc did not do well, and Nicks had to work—as a dental assistant for one day, as a

For the Record…

Full name, Stephanie Nicks; born May 26, 1948, in Phoenix, Ariz. ; daughter of a corporate executive; married Kim Anderson, January 29, 1983 (divorced, April 1984). Education: Attended San Jose State College during the late 1960s.

Sang in gin mills with grandfather, beginning at age 5; member of vocal group Changing Times, c. 1963; member of group Fritz, based in San Francisco, 1968-71; part of duo, with Lindsey Buckingham, Buckingham-Nicks, based in Los Angeles, 1971-75; also worked at various odd jobs, including dental assistant and waitress, 1971-75; member of group Fleetwood Mac, 1975—; also solo recording artist and concert performer, 1981—.

Addresses: Residence —Phoenix, Ariz. Manager —Front Line Management, 80 Universal City Plaza, Universal City, CA 91608. Record company— EMI Records, 6920 Sunset Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90028.

waitress for longer stints—to support herself and Buckingham. As she recalled for Páreles, “Lindsey wasn’t quite so willing to go out and work anywhere. So I figured it was better for him to stay home and practice, because he plays so beautifully, and I’d go out and make the money.”

Meanwhile, Fleetwood Mac underwent yet another major membership change, and were looking for new musicians. The group was also looking for a new recording studio, and they happened upon the one where Nicks and Buckingham had recorded their album. The studio played Buckingham-Nicks for Fleetwood Mac as an example of their finished work, and the band’s remaining members, Mick Fleetwood, and Christine and John McVie, were as much impressed with the artists as with the production. Nicks and Buckingham were contacted, and the duo agreed to become a part of Fleetwood Mac.

Nicks’s first hit with the group, “Rhiannon,” which White lauded as “a surging, mesmerizing song about a Welsh witch,” is exemplary of the other-worldly, supernatural quality of many of her compositions. As Páreles reported, “she believes she has a guardian angel; she believes her soul has been around for three million years. And she is fascinated by all sorts of mystical ideas and … wondrous coincidences.” Banks concurred: “Most of us would like a temporary respite from life’s serrated edges, and a few of us have secret gardens of the imagination into which we occasionally steal. The difference between Stevie Nicks and the rest of the world is that, given the choice, she usually opts for never-never land—and she brings along a lunch pail and a pup tent.” Nicks has been criticized, however, for her music’s mysticism; for instance, Mark Coleman in his Rolling Stone review of Rock a Little, Nicks’s third solo album, judged that “when she starts setting her secrets free, weaving apocryphal situations and creating moony, enigmatic characters, the going gets a bit thick.” But he conceded: “Nicks can still take an unassuming little rock song and polish it into a gem.”

The combination of Nicks, Buckingham, Fleetwood, and the McVies proved the catalyst for Fleetwood Mac to quickly achieve the popularity that had heretofore eluded the band. But success brought problems for Nicks. The strain of constant touring broke up her longtime relationship with Buckingham, along with the marriage of the McVies, and also pushed Nicks’s throat past the breaking point. She occasionally lost her voice onstage, causing the group’s concerts to receive bad press reviews.

With the help of a specialist, however, Nicks resolved her vocal problems, and despite the death of two love relationships, Fleetwood Mac remained intact and turned its turbulent emotions into the best-selling album, Rumours. Many of the record’s hits, including Nicks’s “Dreams,” were autobiographical accounts of the breakups. The group’s follow-up album, Tusk, was not as successful, but Nicks scored a hit on it with the melodic “Sara” —a hit that later embroiled her in controversy when a woman from Grand Rapids, Michigan, claimed that she herself had written it and sent it to Warner Brothers, Fleetwood Mac’s recording company. The suit was eventually withdrawn by the woman’s lawyers, who came to believe Nicks had indeed written it herself—demo tapes of the song, dated months previous to the time the woman said she had sent her lyrics to Warner Brothers, confirmed the fact.

Though Nicks was not inclined to leave Fleetwood Mac, which Páreles compared to “a loving extended family,” she did turn her attention to solo projects with Bella Donna in 1981. Nicks explained to Páreles: “I had to learn to stand up and lead. I had to learn to do this alone.” Her decision proved a good one; not only did Bella Donna bring forth her first solo hit, “Edge of Seventeen,” but her three other solo albums have brought her even more acclaim and popularity with listeners. And Nicks is grateful to her fans. “When I see people singing along to one of my songs,” she confided to Páreles, “I want to go out and hug them. I have trouble remembering the words myself—and they know them all!”