Speaker 1: Check out this clip from a recent episode of Booked
Speaker 1: on Rock Rachel Brodsky. She is the author of the
Speaker 1: upcoming book Lessons and Lace. Everything I know about dreams,
Speaker 1: heartbreak and Magic I learned from Stevie Nicks What's great
Speaker 1: to See. Over the last I guess decade or so,
Speaker 1: she got into the Rock Hall as a solo artist.
Speaker 1: The attendance numbers started to go up, and she started
Speaker 1: to get this recognition even more so than before. Younger
Speaker 1: artists look up to her. But like you write in
Speaker 1: the book, she was once underestimated, misunderstood, dismissed, and mocked.
Speaker 1: And I'm still trying to figure out why that is.
Speaker 1: Why do you think so many critics initially failed to
Speaker 1: recognize her depth as an artist.
Speaker 2: Well, I mean, part of that, I think is just
Speaker 2: old fashioned misogyny in the sixties and seventies women, I mean,
Speaker 2: women have always had to fight their way to the front,
Speaker 2: and you know, women of color especially, But the kind
Speaker 2: of misogynistic takes on women in music have they've changed, like,
Speaker 2: because they do still exist. But then I think it
Speaker 2: was a bit more blatant. So in the sixties and seventies,
Speaker 2: I mean Stevie's basically in like a boys club, and
Speaker 2: to an extent, Rock has always been that way, but
Speaker 2: at this time she is one of many fewer women
Speaker 2: trying to do this.
Speaker 1: You think about how important Stevie and Christy mcvae words
Speaker 1: of Fleetwo Mac, especially as you get the late eighties
Speaker 1: when Lindsay Buckingham exits the band and they carried that
Speaker 1: group in terms of hit singles, keeping them in the
Speaker 1: public eye and writing solid songs.
Speaker 2: Well, when I say that she was underappreciated and undervalued
Speaker 2: and not really taken seriously, I'm thinking mostly of the
Speaker 2: mid seventies when she enters Fleetwood Mac and first they
Speaker 2: You know, when Nick Fleet would expressed interest in bringing
Speaker 2: on Lindsay Buckingham and to Fleet with Mac, it wasn't like, hey,
Speaker 2: like I'd like you and your singing partner Stevie Nicks
Speaker 2: to join. It was oh, I want, I want Lindsay
Speaker 2: and and and uh. I've write a few different takes
Speaker 2: as to who actually settled, but also Stevie Nicks has
Speaker 2: to come. But Stevie, Stevie was sort of Steen is
Speaker 2: more of an adjunct to Lindsay Buckingham's artistry, like Lindsay
Speaker 2: was the one who got to before they joined the
Speaker 2: fleet with Mac, Lindsay was the one who was sort
Speaker 2: of playing out with other bands. He was the one
Speaker 2: who was like in the studio writing, and Stevie was
Speaker 2: who was doing odd jobs like uh, cleaning houses, we
Speaker 2: bussing tables and and so she literally didn't get to
Speaker 2: like matriculate the way that Lin Buckingham did. And so
Speaker 2: when then when she went to you know, be a
Speaker 2: solo artist in the early eighties, there really was this
Speaker 2: big question mark hanging over the whole idea of her
Speaker 2: leaving Fleetwood Mac, even just for like one or two
Speaker 2: album cycles, because one thing, I didn't quite realize that
Speaker 2: like now, when I was, you know, growing up, and
Speaker 2: now people in band singers who start in bands leave
Speaker 2: to do solo material all the time. It's just it's
Speaker 2: it's completely normalized and no one really thinks anything of it.
Speaker 2: But at this time, apparently it was a much riskier,
Speaker 2: a lot a lot less likely, and just a harder
Speaker 2: thing to do. And you know, Stevie is not only
Speaker 2: wanting to go off on her own, but also she
Speaker 2: wants to launch her owin record label, like in order
Speaker 2: to do it, which she does. But Tom Petty, who's
Speaker 2: all over Bella Donna, didn't really like it. Seemed like
Speaker 2: he liked he liked her as a person, but he
Speaker 2: kind of saw her and Fleet with Mac as being
Speaker 2: more like pop radio and maybe a little less serious
Speaker 2: than than you know, Tom, you know, and the Heartbreakers,
Speaker 2: which were like, it's funny to call Tom and the
Speaker 2: Heartbreakers like punk rock, but that was but but but
Speaker 2: punk was kind of their their their philosophy.
Speaker 1: And their mentality, like the labels, Yeah, they were punk
Speaker 1: rock new wave when they first came out.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And so Stevie had. And the last thing I'll
Speaker 2: say is, you know, I read a lot of the
Speaker 2: interviews that Stevie Nix did and with the with Fleet
Speaker 2: with Mac in the mid seventies and these if it
Speaker 2: was a woman writing about her, then then she was
Speaker 2: probably that the woman writer was usually a lot more
Speaker 2: open minded. I guess you could say about about the
Speaker 2: artists that that they she was meeting. But you know,
Speaker 2: there was there were a few mid seventies early eighties definitely,
Speaker 2: I think more so mid seventies interviews with Stevie where
Speaker 2: like the male journalists would be looking at this person
Speaker 2: and just completely writing her office like your your your featherhead,
Speaker 2: Like what are you talking about with like Rihannon and
Speaker 2: crystals and shawls and and like all this mystical all
Speaker 2: this mystical stuff like you like I don't even want
Speaker 2: to touch this, Like you are just unseerious. And and
Speaker 2: that was that was the vibe. And and this is
Speaker 2: not something that I had any idea of. And it
Speaker 2: was so fascinating to kind of go back in time
Speaker 2: in a way just by reading these old interviews and
Speaker 2: like really placing myself back at that at that point,
Speaker 2: because I have only ever, you know, known Stevie Nix
Speaker 2: as being like the like rock and roll fairy godmother
Speaker 2: who inspired legions, legions of singer songwriters, and like I've
Speaker 2: never heard a bad word about her. Oh she's just
Speaker 2: like so bloved. But there was a time when she
Speaker 2: was just utterly dismissed as being like, uh, frivolous.
Speaker 1: Yeah, see that, Well that answers it then, because that
Speaker 1: is before my time as well. So by the time
Speaker 1: I'm a fan, late eighties, early nineties, by that point,
Speaker 1: she's already established herself. But in the beginning, yeah, it
Speaker 1: was a much different time. Which is what that research
Speaker 1: that you did for this book reveals, which leads to
Speaker 1: the next question, because you mentioned you spent a lot
Speaker 1: of time diving into archival interviews, documentaries, lyrics, books, any
Speaker 1: surprising discoveries during your research process.
Speaker 2: I think that was probably the biggest one, just the
Speaker 2: extent to which she was written off, especially with like.
Speaker 2: There there were a few Rolling Stone reviews, not so
Speaker 2: much interviews, but reviews of Fleetwood Max Live shows with
Speaker 2: like in the very beginning in like nineteen seventy five,
Speaker 2: when Stevie and Lindsay joined, where they just you know,
Speaker 2: the reviewer would be watching the show and be just
Speaker 2: kind of like, uh, not really getting what Stevie is
Speaker 2: doing on stage and not really liking her voice, calling
Speaker 2: her voice kind of nasal and appealing, And so that
Speaker 2: just seeing seeing the critical pushback was interesting because I've
Speaker 2: never read any such thing just in my in my
Speaker 2: lifetime with more current media and writers. So that was
Speaker 2: probably the biggest one. I think. Also, I really don't
Speaker 2: think I fully realized the extent to which Stevie felt
Speaker 2: like she had to separate herself artistically from Lindsay, and
Speaker 2: how Lindsay was also quite dismissive of her when she
Speaker 2: went to go do her solo thing, and I don't
Speaker 2: mean to, you know, crap talk Lindsay Buckingham. I'm a
Speaker 2: huge Lindsay Buckingham fan too, but reading more closely about
Speaker 2: their dynamic in the beginning when they joined Fleetwood Mac
Speaker 2: and kind of seeing like relearning how the rest of
Speaker 2: the band kind of saw their dynamic, which they viewed
Speaker 2: as a bit controlling, meaning that Lindsay is seeming a
Speaker 2: bit controlling of Stevie. And then just sort of how
Speaker 2: she slowly kind of gained her self confidence enough to
Speaker 2: separate herself from him and be her own planet, as
Speaker 2: it were.
Speaker 1: Don't miss the full conversation, available wherever you listen to
Speaker 1: your podcasts.