The Fleetwood Mac song Stevie Nicks sang through a cold
Every artist has been known to put their whole being into making a song the best it can be in the studio. While there may be technical flubs left and right whenever a group takes to the stage, it all becomes naked when all that’s separating the artist and the tape is a single microphone in the studio. Even though Stevie Nicks was already going through her private hell during the making of Rumours, she could also nail down one of her best vocals while sick.
Then again, the recording of Rumours would never be easy by nature. Since most of the songs had to do with each band member breaking up, the lyrics practically became weapons against one another, with Lindsey Buckingham penning ‘Go Your Own Way’ about being jerked around by Nicks.
While Nicks had initially wanted the track ‘Silver Springs’ to be her main focal point on the album, the physical medium led to it being shelved for a B-side. Closing the record with ‘Gold Dust Woman’ instead, Nicks plays to her strengths as a mystical spirit of music, singing a siren song to mystical forces, drugs, or both simultaneously.
Even though what Nicks was singing came from the heart, Mick Fleetwood remembered the troubled session that resulted in the final take. Having worked all through the night, Nicks was beaten down by the time she laid down the lead vocal, including nursing a cold that left her voice impaired.
As Fleetwood recalls in Classic Rock Stories, there was an ominous allure to Nicks once she finally regained the strength to sing, saying, “As take followed take, Stevie began to withdraw into herself, reaching inside for the magic. An hour later, she was almost invisible in the shadows, elfin under big headphones, hunched over in her chair, choosing from her supply of tissues, a Vicks inhaler, a bottle of mineral water, and a box of lozenges for her sore throat”.
Even though a cold could be the kiss of death in the studio, Nicks nailed the song in just eight takes, creating a siren song to the gold dust woman that everyone has on their shoulder in life. Then again, there may have also been some spiritual assistance helping Nicks sing it through.
Given her fascination with magical beings in songs like ‘Rhiannon’, ‘Woman’ inherits a similar energy, with Nicks sounding like a spiritual force is overtaking her as she sings through the lyrics. That mystical energy would only grow once she brought the song to the live stage, growing even more energetic with each verse until she’s screaming like a banshee by the end.
Then again, the exhaustion in her voice on the final take could have easily been chalked up to the massive emotional turmoil of those sessions. Alongside Nicks’s challenges, every member had to deal with different setbacks, including one instance where Buckingham almost strangled an engineer because a track got erased. Most of Nicks’ efforts in creating this song may seem superhuman, but for true artists, the music is more than enough to bring them back together.
