Stevie provides an interview about guitarist Waddy Wachtel, her longtime bandmate and friend whom she met in 1973. Here’s an excerpt of the interview:
“Waddy and I sometimes, I think we’re the same person, except from California and New York, because we are like two sides of a coin and that’s why we have been working together for so long I think. Because I would never want anybody else to be my musical director, or my lead guitarist, because Waddy makes me feel safe and always has in any situation, no matter how frightening the situation, as long as he’s standing next to me, I know I’m safe.” – Stevie Nicks
The accompanying documentary soundtrack includes “Leather and Lace,” Stevie’s 1981 duet with Don Henley, as well as archival footage of Stevie working with many of the artists featured in the film.
(Immediate Family Film)
The documentary film is screening for a limited time in select theatres through November.
Stevie Nicks, Bruce Springsteen, Tom Petty and U2‘s Bono and are among the music stars who will appear in a new four-part documentary titled The Defiant Ones, which explores the relationship between rapper and producer Dr. Dre and Interscope Records co-founder and producer Jimmy Iovine. The four-part film, which will premiere on HBO in 2017, will feature interviews with those artists and many others.
The Defiant Ones will be directed by Allen Hughes, whose credits include Menace II Society and Dead Presidents. The documentary also will include previously unseen footage of recording and writing sessions featuring Springsteen, Petty, U2, Stevie Nicks and others.
“The Defiant Ones has everything you expect in a great story — drama and humor, tragedy and triumph,” says HBO executive Casey Bloys in a statement.
The Defiant Ones also will feature appearances by entertainment mogul David Geffen, Springsteen manager Jon Landau, No Doubt‘s Gwen Stefani, Nine Inch Nails‘ Trent Reznor and rap stars Eminen, Nas, Ice Cube, Snoop Dogg and N.W.A.
Stevie will be attending the Australian premiere of her documentary In Your Dreams at the Brisbane International Film Festival (BIFF), according to a new press release. The film premieres on November 13 at 3:00 p.m. Stevie will make a guest appearance at this event. Tickets can be purchased here.
Stevie’s appearance coincides with Fleetwood Mac’s concert at the Brisbane Entertainment Centre on November 14.
If you live in Australia or New Zealand, enter the contest to win the 3CD expanded edition of Rumours. Ten lucky winners will receive a copy, courtesy of Warner Bros. Records!
Monday, June 10 7 + 9:30 pm Tickets $8 advance/$10 at the door 19+ w/ bar service www.riotheatretickets.ca
Stevie Nicks In Your Dreams is an intimate portrait of Stevie Nicks, the Grammy-winning artist and member of legendary rock band Fleetwood Mac, as she creates an album with Dave Stewart of Eurythmics fame. Co-produced and co-directed by Nicks and Stewart, the film goes behind the scenes as Nicks and Stewart embark on a musical journey to write and record the critically acclaimed album In Your Dreams
Nicks, who is presently on a world tour with Fleetwood Mac, called this adventure “the greatest year of my life” and felt compelled to share the joyful experience that she terms “the day the circus came to town” with her fans. The album was written by Nicks and Stewart and produced by Stewart and Glen Ballard, the famed producer of Alanis Morissette’s landmark album Jagged Little Pill. Ballard also appears in Stevie Nicks In Your Dreams, along with Nicks’ Fleetwood Mac band mates Lindsey Buckingham and Mick Fleetwood, and actress Reese Witherspoon.
Stevie Nicks In Your Dreams premiered at The Landmark Theatre in Los Angeles on March 31, 2013, with Stevie Nicks introducing it and taking part in a Q&A. The film then had exclusive showings on April 2nd at theaters in more than 75 cities across the U.S. and Canada.
Virgil Films’ Joe Amodei, who was recently named Film Festival Director of the music-focused CBGB Festival, said: “Stevie Nicks In Your Dreams is that rarest of music documentaries, one that shows the artist actually in the process of creating new music as we watch and listen. To be working with a musical icon like Stevie Nicks is indeed a dream.”
“Nicks is like a USB thumb drive in lace, a small package containing a variety of pop-culture personality tropes. She has been the regulator of weight; the titrator of substances; the veteran of a love triangle; the female artist who escaped the long shadow of a male collaborator; the commercial artist who passed through wildly different stations of commerce; and the canny performer whose utilitarian decisions and whimsical tastes became the totems and scripture of a tribe. She survived both the corrosive lift of cocaine and the lead apron of Klonopin.” — The New Yorker
www.riotheatre.ca
www.riotheatretickets.ca
Jun 10th, 2013
7:00 and 9:30
The Rio Theatre, Vancouver
Cool news from Film at the Erie Art Museum: Dave Grohl’s “Sound City” documentary will open the summer series on June 12.
Grohl’s film chronicles the famed California studio where Nirvana, Fleetwood Mac, Tom Petty and scores of other acts recorded landmark albums. When the film premiered at Sundance in February, Grohl brought some of his “Sound City” pals, including John Fogerty and Stevie Nicks.
One more gig, Dave? In Erie?
“Sound City” doesn’t just tell the story of the recording studio, though. Grohl also assembled some rock greats to record on the studio’s famed analog console to celebrate the warmth of that approach and the human element of music. Look for appearances by Neil Young, Lars Ulrich, Trent Reznor, Josh Homme, Lindsay Buckingham, Paul McCartney, Petty, Nicks and more.
The rest of the Film at the Erie Art Museum’s summer lineup will be announced during a kickoff party before “Sound City” screens. For more details, visit http://filmsocietynwpa.org.
Stevie Nicks In Your Dreams **½ (2½ stars out of 5)
Starring: Stevie Nicks, Dave Stewart
Directed by: Dave Stewart and Stevie Nicks
Running time: 100 minutes
Parental guidance: No problems
Fans of the singer Stevie Nicks — none of whom could possibly be bigger fans than Stevie Nicks herself, it appears — will be in heaven with In Your Dreams, a documentary about the yearlong project to record her 2011 solo album. It’s all there: the inspirations, the moments of musical serendipity, the day Reese Witherspoon dropped by and gave her a title for one of the tunes, the many, many scenes of Nicks writing or singing or talking or just hanging out in her lush California home, being artistic.
Other, lesser fans will have to make do with serendipitous moments of our own: the voice-over when Nicks expresses the wish that In Your Dreams will inspire younger audiences “to go back to the old ways and start over. This is our prayer.” Or the magical moment when, after writing the lyrics to “Italian Summer” at a hotel in Italy, she gives the hand-written manuscript to the front desk clerk and tells him, “Some day this is going to be very important.”
In fact, “Italian Summer” is a good song, one of many we get to enjoy in excerpts from the music videos that also festoon this vanity project. The film, like the album, is produced by Nicks and Dave Stewart, the Eurythmics guitarist, who joins Nicks and several other top-notch musicians. These include Mick Fleetwood and Lindsey Buckingham of Fleetwood Mac, the alma mater for Nicks, plus her longtime backup singers, in whom, she speculates, the public finds “comfort in that love that we have as three very strong women.”
And maybe they do. In Your Dreams features endorsements from members of the public, including an American sailor whose life was altered by “Soldier’s Angel.” Nicks wrote that song after touring Walter Reed National Military Medical Center and seeing the wounded warriors, one of a few genuine moments of emotion in the film. In Your Dreams would be impossible if it wasn’t for the fact that Nicks — whose throaty growl hasn’t lost much of its power — is a talented rock singer and Stewart is, as she informs us, “one of the greatest and grandest guitar players.”
The film only touches on her childhood and early career: this isn’t a portrait of the artist, it’s a diary of the art, including the volumes of her writings that she gave to Stewart as possible lyrics (at one point she compares herself to Bob Dylan). There’s a touching reminiscence surrounding the song “New Orleans,” written six days after Hurricane Katrina and inspired by TV clips of a young boy who looks at the camera and — with shocking and moving frankness — says, “We just need some help sent here. And it’s just pitiful.”
The Witherspoon song comes when the actress tells Stewart he can stay at her condo in Nashville. “It’s cheaper than free,” she says, and the next thing you know, Stewart and Nicks have turned that idea into a love song. Another factoid: “Lady From the Mountains” was inspired by the Twilight movie New Moon, in particular the part where Bella is abandoned by the love of her life, which also happened to Nicks. Hopefully, she says, someone will hear that song and think, “The same thing happened to Stevie Nicks and she’s still alive.”
TORONTO – Fleetwood Mac songstress Stevie Nicks is tantalizing fans with a bold idea: a one-woman show.
Could something along the lines of “My Name is Stevie” (in the vein of Barbra Streisand’s “My Name is Barbra”) or “Stevie With an I-E” (in the spirit of Liza Minnelli’s “Liza With a Z”) be in the tarot cards?
The raspy-voiced veteran says it’s an idea her pal Dave Stewart has been trying to get her to embrace.
Nicks made the comments while appearing at the Canadian premiere of her documentary “In Your Dreams,” which follows her and the Eurythmics hitmaker as they write and record her 2011 album of the same name.
She says Stewart’s plan would involve massive video screens revealing images from Nicks’ storied life. But the “Landslide” crooner is laughing off the idea, noting: “I’m not Barbra Streisand.”
I probably sold 300,000 records [of In Your Dreams]. It’s awesome if you’re an unknown artist, but it’s not really that awesome if you’re Stevie Nicks.
Nicks’ creative bond with Stewart is traced in an affectionate documentary that reveals the veteran rockers nit-picking over melodies and brainstorming lyrics at her home recording studio in California. The film plays in Toronto through Thursday before heading to other cities.
After the film, Nicks told a movie theatre full of fans that Stewart sees a new chapter in her career.
“He wants me to have video screens, like a big room of video screens where it’s all my whole life (up there). And I (said): ‘Dave, I’m not Barbra Streisand’,” Nicks said smiling. “But maybe. Maybe someday.”
She notes that her solo shows already feature a lot of talking, as opposed to the hit-laden concerts with her band Fleetwood Mac.
“It’s very different. Fleetwood Mac’s much more sophisticated and grownup and my show is just like a big slumber party in an auditorium. And I tell everybody the meanings of all these new songs. Because that’s how I draw people in,” says Nicks, who turns 65 on May 26.
After the movie, Nicks took questions from audience members, recounting the origins of her steadfast determination to be a star and dark days surrounding the recording of “Rumours.”
“It wasn’t really a pleasant experience,” she says.
“Lindsey (Buckingham) and I had pretty much just really broken up, and we’d kind of broken up off and on for a year before that. So this is 1977. None of the couples were happy… which, on one hand, really lends to the creative process.”
The film includes interviews with Nicks about Fleetwood Mac’s rise to fame, current sources of inspiration, childhood memories and her surprising passion for the Twilight franchise.
She notes that promoting the album In Your Dreams involved a grueling two years of touring and promotion. In the end, it didn’t amount to much.
“I didn’t sell a lot of records, you guys. For me, for a big act like moi, I didn’t. Worldwide I probably sold 300,000 records. It’s awesome if you’re an unknown artist and you have a hit single but it’s not really that awesome if you’re Stevie Nicks,” she said.
“It’s such a different age now.”
“In Your Dreams” heads to Ottawa on Friday and Saturday. It reaches Winnipeg on May 2, May 3 and May 5; Saskatoon on May 13; Edmonton on May 14; Calgary on May 16; Vancouver on May 18 and 23; and Montreal from June 14 to 17.
Fleetwood Mac performs at the Air Canada Centre on Tuesday. They head to Ottawa on April 23, Winnipeg on May 12, Saskatoon on May 14, Edmonton on May 15, Calgary on May 17 and Vancouver on May 19.
Cassandra Szklarski / The Canadian Press / Monday, April 15, 2013 10:37 PM
Stevie Nicks was in Toronto this week ahead of Fleetwood Mac’s show Tuesday night at the Air Canada Centre.
The singer was promoting her new documentary In Your Dreams. The movie, filmed with Eurythmics’ Dave Stewart, follows Nicks as she makes her 2011 album, also called In Your Dreams.
The Canadian premiere was held at the TIFF Bell Lightbox on Monday night.
“We got stuff that nobody ever gets. We got the actual writing of the songs – nobody ever gets that, because you usually don’t let anybody in while you’re doing it,” Nicks told CityNews at the Lightbox.
“Everybody got a camera. There were like 12 people there with a camera,” Nicks said.
Nicks said Stewart persuaded her to make the documentary and to film it in her house. At first, she said, they were only going to record the album at her home.
When he proposed the idea, she said, “Are you serious? Are you kidding? You mean I have to put makeup on every day?”
She said Stewart promised that if she didn’t like the footage, they wouldn’t use it.
“It was a promise made between the caterpillar and Alice. And I knew it was true,” Nicks said.
In Your Dreams will play at the Lightbox until April 18.
Dave Stewart: Co-director, Stevie Nicks: In Your Dreams
By Susan G. Cole Now Toronto
Monday, April 15, 2013
Dave Stewart put on every one of his musical hats – producer, guitarist, songwriter – for Stevie Nicks’s 2011 disc, In Your Dreams. He adds feature film co-director to his artistic resumé with this documentary tracking the album’s creative process and probing Nicks’s personal history and inspirations. He talked with NOW about that collaboration and why it worked. Stevie Nicks: In Your Dreams screens at the TIFF Bell Lightbox April 15 to 18.
By Sarah Kurchak Spinner
Tuesday, April 16th 2013 4:40PM
Jason Merritt, Getty
Toward the end of In Your Dreams, Stevie Nicks and Dave Stewart’s documentary about the making of their album of the same name which opened at Toronto’s TIFF Bell Lightbox last night, Stewart muses about the magic that he experienced in that year of writing and recording with the rock ‘n’ roll legend and his hopes that a piece of that comes across in the film.
“I hope it brought you a little closer to Stevie’s heart,” he says in his closing narration.
The film certainly lives up to Stewart’s expectations. The result of the producer and former Eurythmics member’s almost obsessive need to film and document everything in his life, “In Your Dreams” takes viewers deep into the year-long creative process behind Nicks’s 2011 album — her first solo release in over a decade — and just as deep into the heart of its co-writer and co-director.
With his omnipresent camera essentially becoming part of the gang, Stewart documents almost every detail of what happened from the time that Nicks asked him to produce her new album to the assembly of her band and crew (including superstar producer Glen Ballard and her Fleetwood Mac bandmates Mick Fleetwood and Lindsey Buckingham) to the videos the crew made to accompany each song on the disc.
Obviously comfortable with her creative partner, Nicks opens up about almost everything. Her family, her early music history, her sometimes rocky history with Buckingham, and her current inspirations are all covered. She even waxes poetically on her love of the “Twilight” films, which were the inspiration for the song “Moonlight (A Vampire’s Dream).
“I was taken with this movie because what happened to Bella absolutely happened to me,” she says about Bella’s post-Edward heartbreak in “New Moon.”
The result of this intimate and open atmosphere is a documentary that actually does make you feel like you’re part of the action, as cliched as that phrase may be. And, as it turns out, the film was only really the opening act for people who attended one of the two screenings and Stevie Nicks Q&As last night. In the flesh, the rock star was even more personable and charming.
Clad in one of her trademark flowing outfits, Nicks amiably sauntered on stage after the screening, settled into her seat and started regaling the sold out crowd with a story about the genesis of the “In Your Dreams” film, and how her own personal insecurities almost destroyed the project before it even began.
Stewart, she explained, original brought up the idea of filming the whole process when he first agreed to produce the album for her. Nicks wasn’t big on the idea, as it stood in the way of all of dreams of recording and home and dressing as a complete slob.
“That means serious hair, makeup and clothes,” she said, in mock horror.
In the end, though, it was Running Down a Dream, the 2007 Tom Petty documentary, that convinced her to give the camera a shot.
“I remember the footage from Tom Petty’s very, very long four-hour documentary, which I personally loved, every minute of it,” she said. “But there was a part on the Traveling Wilburys that was so brilliant and it really showed the five of those guys like they were in the James Gang or something. And we got to see them for a half-hour really be who they were and just looking so handsome and playing this amazing music and then, within minutes, it seemed, two of them died. And if they hadn’t have done that, what a shame that would have been.”
This got her reevaluating her own priorities.
“What a shame it would be if you, Miss Vanity, said no to this because you don’t want to spend a half an hour doing makeup and picking a uniform,” she continued. “What if we come up with something that’s really great and we don’t film it? And then how are you going to feel a year after that? You’re going to go ‘Wow, now you really can admit to the vanity of women because you lost out on something really brilliant.’ So I said ok.”
Soon, she said, her appearance wasn’t even on her mind.
“It’s amazing how easy the process becomes because of the people involved.”
Taking questions from the crowd, Nicks indulged the audience in questions about making the classic Fleetwood Mac album Rumours (“It wasn’t a very pleasant experience,” she quipped before embarking on a more philosophical reflection on the romance and the drama behind those days), and opening up about the death of her mother.
She also talked about how the promotion of In Your Dreams really forced her to adapt to the new realities of the music business. For someone who came of age in a wildly different music industry, it hasn’t always been an easy transition.
“The music business has turned to stone,” she said. “I can’t expect anyone to help me.”
She also pointed out that record companies just don’t have enough money to invest in bands for the long term anymore, using Fleetwood Mac’s post-Rumours career as an example.
“If it had been now and we had done Rumours and had that success and then we did Tusk, the double record from Africa? Warner Brothers would have said ‘Get out and take your African tusks with you!’ It’s such a different age now.”
Nicks credits her fans and their support or allowing her to tirelessly tour and promote “In Your Dreams” and help her make it the modern day music business success that it is. As such, she pointedly thanked those in attendance for their part in it.
“I’m not going to worry about record sales anymore and I’m not going to worry about what people think,” she said. “Because what really matters is what I think, because if I’m thinking good and I’m thinking happy, then what I do is going to turn around and make you feel good. So we just bounce off of each other. I throw the dreams out there and you throw them back at me. And that’s how we make this together. This is not anything that is done by one person. It happens because we’re a team. And you’re my team. You are. I mean that.”
Stevie Nicks is on tour with Fleetwood Mac right now.
Stevie will be attending the Australian premiere of her documentary 
By Dave Richards
