Monday, December 14, 2009

Number 362 - Fleetwood Mac


Number 362

Fleetwood Mac

"Gypsy"

(1982)
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................Genre: Rock...............
Stevie Nicks, lead singer of Fleetwood Mac was my idol, when I was younger I wanted to be her, I wanted to sing like her. Glad I’m not young anymore, I’d never have made a good Stevie Nicks. I’m sitting here remembering where I was, what I was doing, who I was with at this time in my life when I first heard this song. Sucks to be me and have a memory of an elephant sometimes. When she sings lightning strikes maybe once, maybe twice. I think of the 2 men I left to follow my heart. The many hearts I apparently broke. The many places I travelled in search of ‘it’. I did travel the world over. In my travels I found one of the things missing in my life. I found me. How I ever lived without myself astounded me when I realised it.
I guess you could say I had gypsy heart and soul. Isn’t that what a gypsy does, wanders the world over seeking something that they rarely find?
That was 10 years ago. I haven’t looked back, I’ve always look forward. Knew there was still something missing and one day I would find it.
The gypsy heart and soul is no longer, it has found what it sought.
On to the next chapter. ~ [Tez]
art by ardentfem
Fleetwood Mac retreated from the insular strangeness of Tusk and returned to straightforward pop songcraft for Mirage. Boasting a glossy, friendly production that makes even the lesser numbers pleasant and ingratiating, Mirage may not be as compelling as its two predecessors -- Rumours had raw emotion to give it a core, and Tusk had Lindsey Buckingham's runaway ambition -- but the popcraft of Buckingham, Christine McVie, and Stevie Nicks results in enough terrific songs -- notably the hit singles "Gypsy," "Love in Store," and "Hold Me" -- to make the album enjoyable. On March 25, 2009 during a show in Montreal on Fleetwood Mac's Unleashed Tour, Stevie Nicks gave a short history of the inspiration behind Gypsy. She explained it was written sometime in 1978-79, when the band had become "very famous, very fast", and it was a song that brought her back to an earlier time, to an apartment in San Francisco where she had taken the mattress off her bed and put it on the floor. To contextualise, she voiced the lyrics: "So I'm back, to the velvet underground. Back to the floor, that I love. To a room with some lace and paper flowers. Back to the gypsy that I was."~ [Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Music Guide]
Inspiration for "Gypsy"
Oh the noise !
On March 31, 2009, Nicks gave an interview to Entertainment Weekly discussing the inspiration for the song: "Oh boy, I’ve never really spoken about this, so I get verklempt, and then I’ve got the story and I start to screw it up. Okay: In the old days, before Fleetwood Mac, Lindsey [Buckingham] and I had no money, so we had a king-size mattress, but we just had it on the floor. I had old vintage coverlets on it, and even though we had no money it was still really pretty... Just that and a lamp on the floor, and that was it—there was a certain calmness about it. To this day, when I’m feeling cluttered, I will take my mattress off of my beautiful bed, wherever that may be, and put it outside my bedroom, with a table and a little lamp. That's the words: 'So I’m back to the velvet underground'—which is a clothing store in downtown San Francisco,where Janis Joplin got her clothes, and Grace Slick from Jefferson Airplane, it was this little hole in the wall, amazing, beautiful stuff—'back to the floor that I love, to a room with some lace and paper flowers, back to the gypsy that I was.' So that’s what 'Gypsy' means: it’s just a search for before this all happened. And later, I tacked on a line for my friend Robin, my best friend, who died of leukemia: 'I still see your bright eyes.' But then, Robin wasn’t sick yet. She got cancer, and died within a year." ~ [Source: Wikipedia]
For more Fleetwood Mac see #514, #547, #591
For Stevie Nicks see #707
For Jefferson Airplane see #406
For Janis Joplin see #586
What does Rolling Stone think?
Fleetwood Mac boasts the rarest of chart-topping, adult-oriented rock virtues – a group personality. In the three-part harmonies and the assured snap of the rhythm section, we hear five distinct personalities merge into a sound that is unmistakably Mac. On Mirage, Lindsey Buckingham once again reaches into his bag of magicianly production tricks and pulls out an elusive gem of a Fleetwood Mac record that, to borrow some lines from his own "Can't Go Home," has "a face as soft as a tear in a clown's eye." Nicks, whose easy allure has made her the most popular of Mac's front three, is also the most problematic. While Buckingham steals from everybody, Nicks picks her own pocket. Is there a witch in the house who could banish "dream," "gypsy" and (gasp) "velvet underground" from her vocabulary? "That's Alright," with a countryish melody and a demonstrative opening image ("Meet me down by the railway station"), is far and away her best new song. Still, when Fleetwood drops extra drum beats into the belly of the belfry on "Gypsy," it's clear that nobody can weave Stevie's velvet and lace like Fleetwood Mac.
Fleetwood Mac have never pretended to be heavy thinkers. But like E.T. or baseball's pennant race, Mirage is another of 1982's sunny entertainments: it sounds great in the morning and fine over a sunset with wine. ~ [Source:Rolling Stone 1982]
Rolling Stone magazine deemed their '362nd Song of all Time' was "All You Need Is Love" by the Beatles. The Beatles have appeared in The Definitive 1000 of All Time @ see #489, #587, #894, #947
Other songs with reference to the Fleetwood Mac ~ #422, #446, #488, #527, #556, #596, #604, #737, #779, #832, #865
Rolling Stone Top 500 Songs ranked this song at Number (Oh, ah, this song? Well ...) and the Album ranked at (...... the album swas shite!)
This song has a Definitive 1000 rating of 80.4 out of 108
Search Artist here:1-2-3-A-B-C-D-E-F-G-H-I-J-K-L-M-N-O-P-Q-R-S-T-U-V-W-X-Y-Z

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posted by Tez at 1:34 pm

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