Modern 139
Producer: Jimmy Iovine
Track listing: Bella Donna / Kind of Woman / Stop Draggin’ My Heart Around / Think About It / After the Glitter Fades / Edge of Seventeen / How Still My Love / Leather and Lace / Outside the Rain / The Highwayman
September 5, 1981
1 week
For Stevie Nicks, being one-fifth of one of the most successful rock acts of the ’70s wasn’t enough. As a member of Fleetwood Mac, Nicks had enjoyed incredible success with the group’s 1976 self-titled album and Rumours, which had emerged as one of the best-selling albums of all time. Yet Nicks was growing increasingly frustrated with life in the supergroup.
“I was in a very big band, very popular, very successful, and making a lot of money,” says Nicks. “The only problem was that there were three writers for each album. It took a year for us to do an album and then there were two or three years between albums. So for me as a songwriter, there was hardly a reason to bother to write. I started to feel that I was not being allowed to do the thing I love most, which was writing.”
To remedy the situation, Nicks decided it was time to record a solo album. However, it wasn’t an easy decision to make. “Nobody wanted me to do it and possibly risk the future of Fleetwood Mac,” she says. “It was difficult, because I knew that everyone else in the band was going to be angry with me, and they were.”
Once Nicks was able to overcome the guilt and the doubt, she found working on Bella Donna a creative boon. “I used a completely different set of people,” she says. “So from the very beginning, I knew it was going to be real successful, because it was too much fun, it was too interesting, and all the people were totally fascinating. I knew that it couldn’t be wrong if I was standing in a room with that many people who were looking forward to coming to work, as opposed to the usual rock ‘n’ roll attitude.”
Bella Donna only took about three and a half months to record, which was breeze for Nicks, having spent up to year on some Fleetwood Mac albums. “We were very prepared,” she says. “Jimmy lovine and I knew which songs we were going to use,” says Nicks. Before going into the studio, Nicks rehearsed at home with Benmont Tench of Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers, who served as the album’s musical director, and back-up singers Sharon Celani and Lori Perry.
The album also featured other special guests, including Petty, Don Henley and Don Felder of the Eagles, E Street Band member Roy Bittan, and Davey Johnstone of Elton John’s band.
When Nicks asked lovine to produce Bella Donna, he was completing work on Petty’s Hard Promises. “When I decided I wanted to do a solo album, I wanted it to sound like Tom Petty,” Nicks says. “I met Tom through Jimmy and I got to hear some songs he didn’t use that he agreed to share with me.”
One of those songs was “Stop Draggin’ My Heart Around,” which Nicks and Petty recorded as a duet. The track, released as a single, eventually climbed to number three. “That was just an extra gift I got during the recording of the album,” says Nicks.
While “Stop Draggin’ My Heart Around” was written by Petty and Heartbreaker Mike Campbell, the other nine tracks on the album were written or co-written by Nicks.
Bella Donna was a major accomplishment for Nicks, but she couldn’t bask in her solo success for long. She was still a member of Fleetwood Mac, and the band was preparing to record Mirage. “I had to go back because they were waiting for me,” she says. “That was the only drag.”
THE TOP FIVE
Week of September 5, 1981
1. Bella Donna, Stevie Nicks
2. 4, Foreigner
3. Escape, Journey
4. Precious Time, Pat Benatar
5. Don’t Say No, Billy Squier