Stevie Nicks -- Bella Donna (1981)
Ah, Stevie Nicks. Where would I be without thee? Probably a lot less confused about certain song lyrics, that's one thing for sure. Bella Donna is an album that has aged particularly well, and has aged right along with me. From the first 5 beautiful piano chords of the opening track to the final "He the glory/She the love/Still they ride again." of the final song, it's just about as perfect as CDs get. Stevie really hit this one out of the park--not surprising for a debut really. She had all sorts of songs that she'd written that were never going to see the light of day with Fleetwood Mac, so naturally, all the best stuff ended up here.
It's fun to listen to this stuff--I think I dug it out because Anna and I were at the Pizza Pit here in Ames (best pizza in Ames, hands down) the other day and "Stop Draggin' My Heart Around" came on the radio. Ames has a classic rock station (KGGO) that is very strongly associated with my time in college here--mostly because my roommate at the time played it constantly. Well, once I heard "Stop Draggin' My Heart Around" I immediately felt like I was back in college--my 3 year old daughter notwithstanding.
There's not a bad track on the CD--although the highlight for me is "Think About It" (written I'm pretty sure for Christine McVie around the time she was getting divorced from John.) It has the great lyric "Even when you feel like your life is fading/I know that you'll go on forever, 'cuz you're that good/Heartbreak of the moment is not endless/Fortune is your life's love." I think that I've come back to that lyric more times in my life than I care to think about--from my normal adolescent angst to my real adult depression and everything in between. It's hard to think that when you're feeling bad or you've been hurt worse than you could possibly imagine that you'll ever feel good again. But heartbreak of the moment is not endless. Live it and learn it.
Stevie never quite matched the brilliance of Bella Donna in my mind, although Rock a Little is brilliant in its own way--she jettisoned the guitars for 80s synthesizers and came up with something completely different (but Rock a Little is the height of drugged-out-on-cocaine-Stevie) and completely joyful. But nonetheless, Bella Donna is still and probably always will be my favorite of her solo CDs.
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