The band Stevie Nicks became burned out on: “I was forced to listen”
No iconic rock band is safe from being overplayed into the ground by the radio. They may have some of the greatest riffs of all time and wrote the greatest hymns of rock and roll, but if someone insists on playing one artist nonstop for years at a time, there comes a point where anyone is going to be a little bit burned out trying to listen to the same riff for what seems like the millionth time. And while Stevie Nicks normally had time for any band with great hooks, she admitted that she ended up souring on bands that she had to study for too long.
When Nicks was first starting out playing music, though, she was learning the golden age of rock and roll. The world hadn’t yet been shaped by acts like The Beach Boys or anyone from the British Invasion, and when she first stepped onstage, she was already doing dance routines set to legends like Buddy Holly and The Everly Brothers.
And listening to the way that she plays off of Lindsey Buckingham on some of Fleetwood Mac’s greatest songs, it’s easy to hear those sounds creeping back in. Despite the song being written well before Rumours, ‘I Don’t Want To Know’ has the same immediacy as an early Everly Brothers song, complete with Nicks and Buckingham singing in tight two-part harmony with each other the whole time.
If Nicks was the musical spirit of the group, though, Buckingham was the one cracking the whip in the studio. To call him a perfectionist would be underselling it, frankly, and considering the band took special attention to “thank” him in the credits of Tusk, it’s safe to say that he wasn’t exactly cordial when offering feedback on people’s parts or trying to make the greatest pop song ever created.
That wasn’t something that started at the beginning of Rumours, either. Buckingham knew that if he wanted to be the greatest in the world, he would have to study the rock and roll classics like pieces of musical architecture, and once he got Nicks to join him, she found out that she couldn’t listen to The Beatles for years because of how close she had been to their music for so long.
While there isn’t anything wrong with loving whatever the Fab Four created, Nicks remembered having their melodies drilled into her head unwillingly, saying, “[I was] forced to listen to The Beatles. Somewhere I kind of burned out a little bit and said to myself quietly, ‘I’m going and find what I want to sing and listen to, even though I’ll sing what YOU want me to do, and YOU want me to do, and what YOU want me to do when I’m with you. But in my own private time, I’m going to sing to Diana Ross, and I’m going to sing to Aretha Franklin.’”
It’s not like Nicks didn’t pick a worthy substitute, either. There are shades of brilliance in pretty much any of The Beatles’ core singles, but there are some Lennon/McCartney vocal performances that still don’t hold a candle to what Aretha Franklin did in her prime, even managing to give the band a run for their money when she turned songs like ‘Let It Be’ into a gospel standard.
Even though Nicks has come back around to the band’s music today, let this be a lesson to everyone who has tried to force a band onto their friends. It’s fun to come together over a shared musical interest, but there’s a difference between recommendations and musical assault, and Buckingham was definitely guilty of crossing that line more than a few times with Nicks.
Never Miss A Beat
The Far Out Beatles Newsletter
All the latest stories about The Beatles from the independent voice of culture.
Straight to your inbox.