The Stevie Nicks wars and how we won them!

I have a confession to make about Stevie Nicks. Is not just that I adore her but rather back in the nineties, I played a vinyl copy of her song Edge Of Seventeen over an over again at top volume for days and days on end. Eventually, I received a letter from my neighbours, which I still have. The letter said – if you play that awful song one more time we will come for you – there are many of us and it will not be pretty. Do you understand?

I began to play Edge of Seventeen with a renewed determination. This was war! The death stares from my neighbours in the hallways came thick and fast, but I didn’t care. Stevie Nicks and I were allies and nothing could stop us!

Then suddenly, my neighbours gave up. Literally overnight, their animus was gone. I am not sure what happened but I think it may have something to do with my future husband moving into my block. He loved Edge of Seventeen too, and used to play it quite a lot himself. But he also played The Bee Gees (You Don’t Know What it’s Like) To Love Somebody, over and over for hours. He considers the vocal performance as one of the most sublime male vocal that has ever been recorded. They complained to him but the complaints were half-hearted, and anyway, he is the sort of guy you can voice an objection to and he never quite understands what you mean.

So anyway The Stevie Nicks war was won and once won the compulsion to keep playing her left me. To Love Somebody by the Bee Gees never lost its obsessive allure with my husband, however. He listened and listened, just trying, in his words “to work out how it was done.” I’m not sure if he ever found out.

Anyway, here at The Vampire’s Wife, we love the way Stevie Nicks kind of floated as she sang, in her capes and wraps and shawls, just like the white winged dove, singing a song, sounds like she’s singing, oh, baby, oh, said, oh.

From Edge of Seventeen by Stevie Nicks

Well then suddenly
There was no one left standing
In the hall yeah yeah
In a flood of tears
That no one really ever heard fall at all
I went searchin' for an answer,
Up the stairs and down the hall
Not to find an answer
Just to hear the call
Of a nightbird singing
Come away come away

Just like the white winged dove
Sings a song
Sounds like she's singing
Oh baby oh said oh
Just like the white winged dove
Sings a song
Sounds like she's singing
Oh baby oh said oh

 

Bee Gees

From To Love Somebody by the Bee Gees

There's a light
A certain kind of light
That never shone on me
I want my life to be
Lived with you
Lived with you
There's a way
Everybody say
To do each and every little thing
But what does it bring
If I ain't got you,
Ain't got?
Baby

You don't know what it's like,
Baby, You don't know what it's like
To love somebody
To love somebody
The way I love you

In my brain
I see your face again
I know my frame of mind
You ain't got to be so blind
And I'm blind, so so so very blind
I'm a man,
Can't you see what I am
I live and I breathe for you
But what good does it do
If I ain't got you,
Ain't got?
Baby

You don't know what it's like,
Baby, You don't know what it's like
To love somebody
To love somebody
The way I love you